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Orange Landline for Business will provide fixed services to new and existing Orange mobile business users, and will - claims Orange - deliver call charges at up to 20 per cent less than BT. It is part of the company's strategy to provide 'communications whenever, wherever and however' for customers.

The service will involve no minimum call charge and per second billing along with a range of bundle options for differing requirements, with a launch offer of free calls to Orange mobiles for the first three months. There will be a single bill for users of the fixed and mobile services, and a single point of contact for customer services.

A subsidiary of France of Telecom, Orange is aiming the new service as a one-stop-shop for small to medium businesses of up to 215 employees. These may not be quite ready to accept the voice over Internet (VoIP) services offered by the France Telecom ISP, Wanadoo - soon to be re-branded as Orange - and its own convergence of broadband access and voice services. Orange hopes, later this year, to scale the offering up to businesses of 500 employees.

'We are simplifying communications for our SME customers,' said Orange's VP of Business Solutions, Alastair MacLeod. 'By bringing together mobile and fixed services total spending for the customer will be reduced and, by working with just one supplier, the supply chain

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and service support models will be simplified. Customers will also be able to benefit from Orange's fantastic, award-winning dedicated business customer service for their fixed line services too.'

The move is seen, by the Financial Times, as being in line with France Telecom's strategy of 'converging' fixed and mobile services, as it has already done in France and Belgium. Triple-play, and indeed quadruple-play - where TV services are added to Internet, phone and mobile services - are seen as the future for telcos looking to maximise the revenue from digital data travelling across their networks.

Orange is able to provide the service under Ofcom's Wholesale Line Rental programme: BT is obliged to allow operators to offer line rental and calls to customers over its network. Orange's Head of Convergence for Business Customers in the UK, Jason Ellis, told us that this deal had 'matured sufficiently' in the last six months to make the new developments feasible.

A typical call profile would see savings of 20 per cent, he maintained, which is a figure needed to motivate businesses to change. He denied any overlap with Wanadoo's current offerings, but declared that, 'Broadband will be at the heart of our offerings as we move forward.'

Challenging Orange, but coming from the other direction, will be BT itself and its Fusion phone offering. This is a mobile phone that uses Bluetooth and IP technology to automatically connect to a landline when used at home.

The BT Fusion is the fruit of more than a year's work and cuts the cost of using mobile phones to the same level as using a standard, wired phone. It also ensures a reliable signal strength as, according to BT, 19 per cent of mobile users have had problems with coverage at home.