SINGAPORE (Jan 23): Optus Business, the Australian unit of Singtel, has entered into a five-year contract agreement worth A$75 million (S$80.7 million) with Flight Centre Travel Group.

Flight Centre is Australia’s largest retail travel outlet and is headquartered in Brisbane.

As part of the contract, Optus will within the next 12 months migrate Flight Centre to its CCaaS platform — a virtualised contact centre solution — thus enabling Flight Centre to increase its focus and resources to boost customer experience, improve staff management and other service offerings.

In a media release on Monday, Optus says the agreement will see Optus’ delivery of “a range of new collaboration and communication services, as [Flight Centre] embarks upon the next phase of its transformation strategy to 2021.”

The contract will support wider business objectives, including delivering global security, mobility, expansion of data connectivity, as well as unified communications and collaboration services to more than 1150 stores and 9000 staff throughout Australia, adds the company.  

“As Australian organisations address the challenges of disruption, our ongoing strategic relationship between Optus and Flight Centre highlights the importance of partnership and collaboration in tackling evolving customer expectations in an ever-changing technology landscape,” comments Optus managing director John Paitaridis.

“Key to our successful transformation is the shared desire with Optus to deliver superior experiences for our customers,” says Melanie Waters-Ryan, Flight Centre CEO.

“Building on our successful partnership with Optus, we are delighted to be investing in our critical technology platforms and capability to deliver a great service for our customers in Australia, in the retail stores, online and contact centres.”

Shares of Singtel closed 0.8% higher at S$3.81 on Friday.