Vodacom Business is now certified as a Microsoft Teams Operator Connect partner in South Africa. This allows the brand to launch Vodacom Operator Connect, which offers a more programmatic approach to provisioning, managing, supporting and billing Microsoft Teams services.

The service essentially allows enterprises to use their chosen telecommunications provider to power Teams calling.

Customers benefit from a more streamlined process – making it easier to select their operator of choice, provision numbers and manage their environment, all from the familiar Teams Admin portal.

In addition, Vodacom Operator Connect allows Microsoft Teams users to save on their monthly fixed voice spend, while giving them enhanced call quality through cloud-based telephony.

This is a welcome offering for the more than 300 million monthly active users on Teams. And with Microsoft’s recent announcement that a new and faster version of Teams will be made available to all customers later this year, enterprise-grade reliability is non-negotiable.

“As one of only a handful of Microsoft partners in South Africa who can deliver Microsoft Teams Calling via the Operator Connect model, Vodacom Business is showcasing our commitment to bringing world-class, best-of-breed, enterprise-grade communication services to our South African customers. It speaks volumes that we are one of the few trusted operators working with Microsoft to roll out this service,” says Joel Chacko, executive head of department for Microsoft services at Vodacom Business.

As a Microsoft partner, Vodacom Business is committed to providing customers with the best communication solutions and this approval demonstrates the brand’s ability to deliver quality services and support for Microsoft Teams.

‘Modern calling experience’

“Operator Connect for Microsoft Teams helps deliver a modern calling experience,” says Shaun Reuben, global partner solutions director at Microsoft South Africa. “The hallway chats and informal customer conversations that we used to rely on to strengthen connections and build new ones are now happening digitally. We are working closely with operators like Vodacom Business to create a seamlessly integrated solution that is simple and quick to deploy.”

“Our customers turn to us to provide them with trusted, innovative solutions that meet their business needs. Our collaboration with Microsoft enables our customers to explore the benefits of using Microsoft Teams with our services as part of Vodacom Operator Connect while taking advantage of new opportunities through seamless, reliable connectivity tools. This forms part of our purpose of building an inclusive digital society,” adds Chacko.