On February 14, Valentine’s Day, Verizon Business—a unit of Verizon Communications—announced the expansion of its business continuity services portfolio that illustrates how major telecommunications carriers are broadening their capabilities and reshaping the competitive landscape.

While most people who follow the telecommunications market refer to the ‘triple-play’ being offered by the leading ISPs as a bundle of telephone, internet and TV services, Verizon Business’ latest announcement shows how the carriers are also creating another form of triple-play which includes consulting, hosting and software services.

In the case of Verizon Business’ business continuity services, the first part is a set of consulting services that includes business impact analyses, gap analyses, strategy workshops, asset inventories and vulnerability assessments.

The second component is the company’s hosting portfolio which leverages its global network of data centers and includes a virtual file sharing service—Resilient Network Attached Storage—with centralized file management, security, business recovery and remote access.

And, now Verizon Business is adding software services as the third element in the form of a redistribution agreement with Strohl Systems to supply customers with Strohl’s business continuity planning software which includes three components:

1. BIA Professional, a business impact analysis survey tool.
   LDRPS (Living Disaster Recovery Planning System), a central repository of complex business continuity data.
2. Incident Manager, an online command center that administers and monitors business recovery activities.
3. The software is currently sold as a traditional, packaged, on-premise product which Verizon Business intends to help Strohl convert into a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), hosted solution.

After recently announcing a SaaS enablement deal with NOW Solutions in December, Verizon Business is becoming an interesting new player in the rapidly growing SaaS market.

While most SaaS vendors looking for a hosting company would focus on IBM, OpSource or some other recognized provider in the past, Verizon Business is beginning to assert itself as a viable alternative. It has a solid delivery infrastructure, an experienced staff, a combination of professional and managed services capabilities, and a vast installed base of customers.