PR NEWSWIRE:  June 5th, 2007

Optelcon Teams with Ernest Communications on Telecom Cost Management for Mobile Spend

SUMMARY: Telecom cost management solutions provider Optelcon recently announced a strategic alliance with Ernest Communications (ECI) to develop and deliver a mobile communications service.

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 Telecom cost management solutions provider Optelcon recently announced a strategic alliance with Ernest Communications (ECI) to develop and deliver a mobile communications service complying with ECI's "No-Line-Left-Behind" offering for nationwide, multi-location enterprise accounts.

This service is being developed to give enterprise customers with the ability to significantly lower their monthly spend on mobile phone assets. It offers tools to manage assets more efficiently by automating rate change selections.

Customers already using ECI's No-Line-Left-Behind local service now can reap the benefits of bundled rate plans. New customers can lock in ECI as a single source for nationwide and local phone service-both wireline and wireless.

ECI senior vice president Jay Morris said that his company has spent 22 years building a reputation as a telecom services provider focused on large, multi-location accounts.

"Our service model stands out as one that allows companies to focus their telecom resources on more mission critical IT applications rather than auditing and tracking basic dial-tone and other telecommunications services," Morris said in a statement.

Morris continued: "We are known for listening to our customers and ECI EnCompass will allow us to continue to deliver what customers need; the freeing of precious IT and accounting resources shackled to audits, inventory analysis, expense tracking along with daily adds, moves and changes."

The new service, dubbed EnCompass, differs somewhat from ECI's traditional, local offerings, for which the company acts as the phone company. EnCompass for mobile is, instead, carrier-agnostic. The result is that enterprises can obtain excellent savings on their mobile phone spend by optimizing existing carrier plans-it isn't necessary to change providers or even consolidate to a single carrier.

Optelcon and ECI decided to team up on this new service after they researched one another. In the case of Otpelcon, the research involved looking for best-in-breed local phone services. In the case of ECI, the research involved looking for a software company capable of designing and delivering features needed to manage thousands of devices and possible rate plans.

"Optelcon, while working with a large multi-location retailers on Mobile management opportunities identified a need for a comprehensive national solution for local telephone service similar to what ECI was proposing for mobile with a client," explained Optelcon president and CEO Robert Pommer, in a statement. "ECI was the only company that met both our standards for quality, and truly understood the mutual gains achieved by marrying the two services."

At the same time, ECI was evaluating several potential partners in its quest to deliver additional value to customers through telecom cost management services and technology. ECI concluded that only Optelcon would do.

"This type of service is not new, but ECI understood that Optelcon is first and foremost, a software development company delivering telecom solutions, not the other way around," Morris said. "I believe we are both very optimistic and excited about the opportunity to work together and the products we will jointly develop."

For those not familiar, ECI is a privately-held, nationwide competitive local exchange carrier with headquarters in Norcross, Georgia. The company delivers a single-source, one-bill solution with dedicated customer service for nationwide, multi-location accounts throughout the U.S. ECI's customers include retailers, insurance industries, quick-serve restaurants, and financial institutions.