DIGICEL Jamaica has tapped Suzanne Saunders to provide strategic leadership for its portfolio of business solutions, one of the fastest growing areas of the company’s operation.

Saunders, a former LIME executive, joined the commercial team at Digicel Jamaica in February as Head Business Solutions. This critical area includes the business sales, service delivery and customer support teams, the company said on Friday.

“Digicel is making a major shift, internally and externally. We are moving from being just a mobile entity to a full service provider of mobile services and business solutions. To that end, our Business Solutions team has been restructured to bring together the right skill sets and talents to build a division that will support our customer’s needs within the corporate solutions space,” said Saunders.

“Our customers expect that we are able to look after them; they’re looking for a highly efficient team that can offer then solutions, connectivity and continuity. We have aligned our business to meet the needs of these customer segments and verticals,” she added.

Saunders identified the hospitality industry as one of the customer segments that her team will partner with.

“The hospitality industry requires very skilled individuals who know the hotel industry and, in our case, able to support these customers in helping them through cyclical revenues. Cost reduction is foremost in everyone’s mind, and our products, services and technology, have to be able to help address the main points for these businesses. Our business has been structured around our customers, and is focused on making the process of doing business with us a productive experience,” she said.

Speaking on key projects, Saunders was very passionate about the importance of disaster recovery in the Jamaican environment.

“I cannot stress the critical importance of disaster recovery and protection of vital business data. Businesses are already operating with tight budgets these days, so imagine the financial damage that even one hour of downtime can do to your business, let alone 24 hours,” she said, noting “So one of my main focuses, along with my team, is to build greater awareness around our world class data centre and ultimately help all businesses see how disaster recovery through our data centre can help them to eliminate the cost of having to restore lost data, plus lost business.”

Opened in 2009, Digicel’s Data Centre is the only Tier III-certified facility of its kind in the Caribbean. This certification means that every component of Digicel’s infrastructure has the resilience and redundancy necessary to keep its facility fully operational in the event there is a major power system failure, or if the systems need to be taken out of production for planned maintenance activities.

The ICT Business Solutions head also mentioned that based on current discussions, she is confident that some of the key companies in Jamaica will become clients of Digicel’s Data Centre over the coming months, in addition to its existing local and regional client base.

Prior to joining Digicel, Suzanne served in several senior commercial roles across a myriad of industries. Among her former roles was Regional Head — Corporate Customer Segment for LIME, where she had responsibility for strategic planning and implementation for their corporate channel.

“I believe that I bring a strong international sales and marketing background to Digicel, having worked within large corporate entities in Jamaica and within the Caribbean region. I have had the experience of working through two major business transformations,” Saunders said.

“My experience, in successfully navigating these companies’ sales and service teams through these transformations, will be integral to Digicel. It is about making this shift, while still building our revenues, and our business,” she added. “My telecommunications background, having been with LIME for six and a half years, brings knowledge of the industry, being with a company that is over 120 years old and a full service provider, to going to a company that is 11 years old, determined, vibrant and passionate about its market share in Jamaica.”

Prior to LIME, Saunders served with the GraceKennedy Group at Grace Foods International where she managed the marketing portfolio for 13 countries in the Southern Caribbean.