BT's quarterly newsletter for industry analysts 
60 second guides
BT and the NHS, working together for 60 years
BT's relationship with the NHS dates back 60 years to when the very first NHS hospitals were established in 1948. Back then, BT was known as Post Office Telecommunications and provided the NHS with telephone services.
More recently, BT has become increasingly involved in the broader application of communications and IT services in today's NHS and is playing a pivotal role in the National Programme for Information Technology, the world's largest civilian IT project.
Did you know?
- In 1948, BT scientists helped to develop and produce the first hearing aid to be truly available to all. The Medresco hearing aid worked on the same principles as a telephone, with amplified sound feeding straight into the ear.
- In the 1950s, BT developed the first 'mobile' hospital phone, as part of the bedside telephone programme.
- Today BT is the biggest supplier of IT and communications services to the health service.
- BT is the only company in the world with experience of designing and running integrated, secure, end-to-end health IT systems and services on a national scale.
- In March 2007, when BT completed its roll-out of PACS – the digital X-ray system – London became the only capital city in the G8 to have all its medical images digitised.
- The internet gateway for the N3 broadband network that BT has built for the NHS is one of the biggest in Europe. At its busiest time it allows the NHS to download the equivalent of the entire contents of the English language Wikipedia – all 2.5 million articles – every minute.
21CN – did you know?
The scope of 21CN has been expanded and now includes:
- The introduction of software-driven service innovation capabilities.
- More elements designed to meet the needs of BT's enterprise customers and global reach.
- New technology in the mobile space to improve access to services from any device from anywhere.
- Consistency between 21CN and BT's planned roll-out of next generation fibre access.
Progress so far:
BT's customers are already benefiting with great new services such as 21CN Ethernet and 21CN Broadband being made available more quickly and at lower cost. In addition:
- BT has made substantial cost savings achieved to date (£600 million gross) against the £1 billion target with further to be achieved over the next several years.
- The UK core infrastructure is 100 per cent complete (was 58 per cent at Q4 07/08).
- The BT 21CN Global Platform is 100 per cent complete and available in around 170 countries.
- 21CN Wholesale Broadband Connect is available from exchanges serving more than one million UK homes (July 2008). The aim is to have ten million homes by April 2009.
- 21CN Ethernet available to around 20 per cent of UK business market (May 2008). BT aims to reach 80 per cent by April 2009.
- BT's SDK (software developer's kit ) in use among thousands of independent applications developers worldwide, as well as across BT.
BT Technology Journal
Now in its 25th year of publication, the BT Technology Journal (BTTJ) has begun serving a global audience thanks to its new online site. The quarterly online and paper publication already enjoys a worldwide reputation as one of the foremost showcases for technical papers in the field of information technology innovation and development and incorporates more than 400 thought-leading articles on technology.
John Seton has recently become editor-in chief, of the Journal. He is keen for BTTJ to continue to address the hot topics faced by BT and the ICT industry.
He said: "BTTJ demonstrates that BT has a high quality programme of research and innovation that is addressing challenges and issues that are important both to our business and the businesses of our customers."
John said he is also looking forward to developing the new online BT Innovation Journal which is intended to contain a broader mix of papers – typically of a shorter length – covering technology, business thought leadership and all aspects of business transformation involving people, processes, systems and platforms.
He added: "The journals enhance BT's reputation globally by openly demonstrating the depth of our thinking, innovation, insight and connectedness within the business and academic innovation ecosystems."
