Verizon Business entered into a long-term deal to transfer the management and support of global enterprise customers to HCLTech in a move that will also include the move of current Verizon Business employees to the India-based managed network services (MNS) provider.

Scott Lawrence, SVP of global solutions at Verizon Business, explained in an interview with SDxCentral that the deal will involve HCLTech handling support services for Verizon Business’s global footprint except for its public sector business, which for now will remain under Verizon Business’s control. The move will tap HCLTech’s local presence and established platforms to help accelerate customer digital transformation and support efforts.

Lawrence explained that Verizon Business will continue to lead all customer acquisitions and sales, as well as overall planning and development with enterprise customers.

“Then HCLTech will lead the post-sale implementation and ongoing support,” Lawrence said. “What's included in this is all of our managed service portfolio, but also our global operations components such as customer service management, provisioning for our wireline [MNS], project and program assurance, and project management. And then a wide scope of solutions will be supported under this such as our managed network services, our security services, managed [unified communications], [customer experience (CX)] and Network Pro Services.”

Verizon Business is targeting a number of growing service segments, with Lawrence specifically citing technologies like SD-WAN and secure access service edge (SASE), “and by extension cybersecurity services, manage unified communication collaboration, and CX and cloud services.”

HCLTech will also gradually take over all current Verizon Business agreements with its managed network service customers beginning later this year.

Included in this transition will be a “select number of people.”

“We are moving certain roles within our global customer operations team that will continue to work on Verizon accounts and support our MNS customers today,” Lawrence said. “They will be an extension of HCLTech and that is a critical component of this because as HCLTech is taking on some of the operational and implementation delivery capabilities, they want to ensure that we have the appropriate support with intimate knowledge of our customers.”

Lawrence touted HCLTech’s leadership position in the market, including the firm being placed in the “leaders” quadrant of Gartner’s 2022 ranking of worldwide “Managed Network Services.” Others in that quadrant included MetTel, ATSG, Microland and WiPro.

“They are a leader in the digital engineering and cloud services space, with enormous value in depth and breadth across both vertical and horizontal industries and geographies,” Lawrence said. “They have over 223,000 people in 60 countries, so their footprint and span and scope is very much aligned with our global footprint and scope as well. They have more than 30 years of experience in the managed network services.”

The deal also offloads Verizon Business’s ongoing development of advanced managed network services, which Lawrence said will accelerate its ability to support more advanced digital transformation tools.

“This will allow us to leapfrog into next-generation contemporary digital platforms, which Verizon has been exploring over the last 18 to 24 months,” Lawrence said. “But the ability for us to build that ourselves versus leveraging these contemporary platforms that HCLTech already has in play will give us a competitive advantage over our competitors. And make no mistake: From our perspective, we are absolutely in the global managed network services business.”

Verizon CFO Tony Skiadas just this week complimented the work Verizon Business CEO Kyle Malady has been doing with that division.

“On the business side, the momentum is going great,” Skiadas said during this week’s Oppenheimer Technology, Internet & Communications Conference. “Kyle and the team have been doing a wonderful job, and we expect that momentum to continue as well.”

Malady took over Verizon Business earlier this year, moving from leader of Verizon’s Global Networks and Technology division and taking over the business unit from Sowmyanarayan Sampath, who moved to head up Verizon’s consumer business.

CORRECTION: This story has been corrected to cite Gartner's "Managed Network Services" report.