Category: Our News

Kalaam Telecom, a leading managed solutions provider for business across GCC and international markets, announced its partnership with Gulf Cooperation Council Interconnection Authority (GCCIA), to launch Kalaam Network Optical Transit (KNOT), a new fiber-optic terrestrial international cable system that enhances regional and international connectivity in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

The KNOT terrestrial Fiber-optic cable system will span over 1,400km, providing a capacity of 12.8 terabytes (tbps) and beyond, with lowest latency connectivity to the MENA region. The network expansion project will benefit local, regional, and global customers to seamlessly connect to & from Bahrain to other GCC countries and further towards Europe and Asia regions. This will also provide opportunities to businesses in Bahrain to open up new data routes which can be tailored to meet their connectivity needs.

Veer Passi, CEO of Kalaam Telecom said, “Kalaam chose to invest in this multi-million dollar network expansion to support the Kingdom of Bahrain’s vision toward positioning Bahrain as a major ICT, Cloud and innovation hub in the MENA region.

“With the launch of KNOT, an open cable system, Kalaam will continue its legacy of being an innovative & disruptive solution provider, which aims to make connectivity in the MENA region more competitive. This will provide a highly scalable alternative to carriers, CDNs, OTTs, Cloud Providers, Data centers, and Enterprises to benefit from innovative solutions and enhanced communications experience.” Added Mr. Passi

The KNOT cable will support large corporates & enterprises in Bahrain in expediting their journey of digitization of the business process. Being an AWS & Microsoft cloud partner, this will enable Kalaam to provide very fast, secure, and cost-effective communication from Bahrain to other GCC countries & Cloud data centers, boosting Bahrain as a hub for innovative services. The cable will go live in Q4-2020.

Eng. Ahmed AL-Ebrahim, CEO of GCC Interconnection Authority commented: “I’m delighted to be able to announce the commercial agreement with Kalaam telecom – an achievement that will provide tangible benefits for all consumers, businesses, and industry and is a further proof point of how GCCIA fiber network is the preferable network in the Gulf.

Kalaam Telecom, a leading managed solutions provider for businesses across GCC and international markets, has emerged as a winner for The Bahrain Award for Entrepreneurship as the “Enterprise of the Year with International footprint” at the Award Ceremony held yesterday at Isa Cultural Hall.

The Award was held under the patronage of His Royal Highness Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince, Deputy supreme Commander and First Deputy Prime Minister. The Bahrain Award for Entrepreneurship celebrated the achievements of Bahrain’s entrepreneurs and their socio-economic role in spurring a private sector driven economy.

Kalaam Telecom’s Chairman, Mr. Nezar Al Saie said, “Kalaam’s success is attributable to a number of factors including a clearly defined strategy of focusing on serving the enterprise market, of expanding its value-added services, and a regional expansion beyond our home market in Bahrain. This award recognizes Kalaam as the only Bahraini telecom company to become a regional operator through the acquisition of Tawasul Telecom in Kuwait.

Kalaam’s motivated, competent professionals understanding of our customers’ needs and focus on delivering best customer experience is a major competitive edge.”

Nezar Al Saie further added “Kalaam’s owners are committed and focused on creating long term value. Additionally, the excellent ecosystem that exists in Bahrain being the most liberal telecom market in the region with a comprehensive telecom law that is bench-marked with the best practiced telecom laws, and vigorously & equitably enforced by the Telecom Regulatory Authority (TRA) have insured a fair level-playing field for all telecom service providers, large or small. As part of this positive ecosystem, Tamkeen has played an important role in nourishing and fostering the growth of small & medium sized companies such as Kalaam through various programs such as training and wages support and business development support.”

The company currently has a presence in 6 countries including Bahrain, UAE, Kuwait, KSA, Singapore and UK.

Kalaam Telecom, a leading managed solutions provider for businesses across GCC and international markets has achieved PCI DSS v3.2.1 by crossbow labs, a leading cybersecurity company specializing in compliance based on BFSI, Retail, and IT/TES organizations.

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS v3.2.1) certification has been awarded to Kalaam Telecom on achieving compliance on one of the most coveted security data standards. PCI DSS is a standard that must be met by every organization that is involved in handling credit, debit, prepaid, and POS cards.

The PCI DSS helps the BFSI industry to maintain privacy, integrity, and authenticity of information to assure customer trust.

Mr. Veer Passi CEO of Kalaam Telecom said “We are proud to have achieved the Global standard PCI DSS certification which is one of the key requirements for the financial segment. Being specialized in providing customized solutions to the BFSI industry, it was mandatory to follow every guideline set by the PCI security standards. This compliance framework protects the financial institutions’ data against fraud, theft, and safeguards information in a secure environment through a global standard for payment card security.

Kalaam Telecom, a leading managed solutions provider for businesses across GCC and international markets, has emerged as a winner for the “Best Managed ICT Service Provider of the year” at the Enterprise Transformation Summit and Awards 2019, regions largest gathering of CXOs held at the Conrad Hotel, Dubai on 7^th October 2019.

The regions’ largest convention & awards for IT Maestros & Accelerators was held during the GITEX technology week and recognized outstanding IT deployments by companies and superlative achievers in C-level decision making roles from across all verticals, both government and private enterprises. The awards were judged by an eminent jury panel with neutral standing and experts from various industries.

Kalaam Telecom’s CEO, Veer Passi received the award at the glittering awards gala. An elated Veer said, “This recognition goes in line with our company’s vision to become a leading ICT Managed solutions provider in the Gulf for the enterprise, corporate and wholesale customers. This achievement has been possible due to the constant innovation of products and solutions by Kalaam team.

Veer Passi further added “Kalaam’s vision has been in line with Bahrain’s Economic vision 2030 which gives us a direction that the Kingdom wants to take the ICT segment forward by supporting the small and medium enterprises. This paved way for Kalaam to introduce leading and innovative solutions such as AWS Direct Connect, Unified Communications, Email and Collaboration, SD-WAN, Industrial IoT, Managed Security, and Cloud Contact Center. The Vision is to make Bahrain a regional ICT hub and winning this award fulfills our vision to reality, broadening our Managed ICT services portfolio in the region. It is indeed an honor for us to win this prestigious award and today Kalaam Telecom has become the operator of choice for businesses and other carriers due to its wide presence regionally.”

The company currently has a presence in 6 countries including Bahrain, UAE, Kuwait, KSA, Singapore, UK, and growing continually since its inception in 2005 as a regional telecom and managed ICT solution provider.

Kalaam Telecom, one of the largest telecom and managed solution providers for the enterprise market in Bahrain, was conferred the “Fastest Growing Telecom Company” award at the 6^th Annual International Finance Awards 2018. Hosted by International Finance, a premium financial and business analysis magazine, the Awards function was held at the Jumeirah Emirates Towers, Dubai on 17^th January 2019.

The telecom award category recognizes industry talent, leadership skills, brand strategy, and regional expansion. Kalaam’s ability to successfully meet aggressive goals and seamlessly add disruptive innovative solutions is quite unique. Over the years Kalaam is the only local operator to broaden their horizons with the acquisition of a regional telecom player, Tawasul Telecom, Kuwait.

It’s relentless contribution and state-of-the-art solutions offered to the telecom sector has been recognized by the International Finance Telecom Jury and hence the award.

The company’s success is driven by its highly innovative product strategy, from an integrated telecom solution to managed ICT solutions such as Infrastructure, Cloud solutions, and partnerships with Microsoft Azure and AWS, IoT, Software Defined Network, Online Web Services, Unified Communication, and collaboration. Kalaam has continued to deliver future technologies to save cost, agility, scalability, and increased customer experience in all Industry verticals.

Kalaam Telecom’s Chief Executive Officer, Veer Passi was there to collect the award and was felicitated at the glittering awards gala. An elated Veer said, “ Recognition for the growth we have achieved is heartening and has been possible due to the admirable work of Kalaam team members who are so passionate about delivering innovative solutions. With such prominent companies on the list, it is indeed an honor for us to receive this award. This is also a testament for us to continue providing pioneering solutions to all industry segments, whilst ensuring to better serve our customers with an ongoing commitment to quality service, business integrity, and forward-thinking technology.”

The company currently has a presence in 6 countries including Bahrain, UAE, Kuwait, KSA, Singapore, UK, and growing continually since its inception in 2005 as a global telecom and managed ICT solution provider.

Bahrain, 22 May 2018:Kalaam Telecom, a leading managed solutions provider for businesses across GCC and international markets achieved Amazon Web Services (AWS) Standard Technology and Direct Connect Partner status. This achievement qualifies Kalaam to provide AWS cloud portfolio to its customers along with private and secure connectivity to AWS cloud from any part of the world.

 Enterprises and governments wanting to deploy critical, real-time and core applications on cloud are often challenged by the non-deterministic performance, diminished security, lack of reliability and QoS capabilities associated with accessing via public internet. AWS Direct connect resolves this issue by providing on-demand, reduced network latency, increased bandwidth performance, enhanced data security and deliver resilient network experience with unparalleled customer satisfaction. Customer can avail this high-performance cloud connectivity service to transfer data between AWS cloud and customer datacenter, office, or colocation environment with the help of Kalaam’s resilient global data network via its 16 fully managed Point of Presence (PoP) across the globe.

 Commenting on the achievement, Veer Passi, CEO, Kalaam Telecom said, “Amazon Web Services (AWS) is one of the most successful cloud platforms, that has been adopted by a myriad of organizations worldwide. This partnership reasserts Kalaam Telecom’s strategy to accelerate digital transformation and further enrich the country’s digital vision. It recognizes the need for helping enterprises handle rapid data growth within tight budgets and enables us to take a more flexible, agile and innovative approach to cloud based deployments.   Plus, the AWS platform is very secure; it doesn’t limit capacities and can scale to meet demand. This achievement also boosts Kalaam Telecom’s cloud solution portfolio thereby also solidifying its position in the ICT and cloud managed service space. ”

Kanoo Travel – a division of Yusuf bin Ahmed Kanoo group (YBA Kanoo Group) and one of the largest travel companies in the region has awarded the cloud-based contact centre solution to Kalaam Telecom, a Global managed solutions provider for businesses across GCC and international markets.

This deployment was aimed at enabling Kanoo’s customers and employees to enjoy cross-region communication efficiently over a single platform and reduce the use of physical infrastructure and OPEX costs.

“For 81 years Kanoo Travel provided its customers with innovative, high-quality and cost-effective travel solutions, which will be enhanced further by adapting a cloud-based contact centre.” Nabeel Khalid Kanoo, Board Director at YBA Kanoo Group said.

Kanoo Travel interim EGM, Mr. Zaeem Gama also added “We are delighted to have Kalaam Telecom as our technology provider. Their single voice platform will reduce cost significantly and unify communications.”

Mr. Veer Passi, CEO of Kalaam telecom said “Kalaam Telecom being a very nimble operator, has always been ahead of the curve with its disruptive solutions and market-leading technologies. Our cloud-based contact centre and feature rich IP telephony solution gives a revolutionary edge to enterprise customers, which allows enterprises to rest on the investment that Kalaam has made. By doing so, they get all features of a contact centre without having to make a large investment. Moreover, it offers multiple benefits such as customized live dashboard, greater visibility of the agents, adding and removing agents in real-time, enhancing IT Manager’s visibility and enhancing productivity. As a result of this, enterprises can focus more on their business objectives rather than the technology for managing their contact centres.

“Kalaam recently deployed this solution for Kanoo Travel, one of the largest travel agencies in the Middle East for their contact centres in UAE, Bahrain and Saudi. Offering this cloud-based contact centre not only unifies their customer experience from any region but also benefits Kanoo by reducing communications costs. With efficient reporting and meeting clients SLA’s, this consolidated contact centre also gives them the flexibility to centralise their business.”

Kalaam Telecom, one of the largest telecom service providers and managed solution provider for the enterprise market in Bahrain recently ventured into the world of Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) in association with Altizon Systems, USA – a global industrial IIoT solution provider. The launch was held on 24 July 2018 at the Wyndham Grand Hotel and was attended by over 100 visionaries from various industries in Bahrain who are keen on adopting and evangelizing IoT and its long-term benefits.
The objective of this launch is to support industrial 4.0 solutions and digitalize industries by connecting all its legacy machines into IoT platform.

During the event, there were real case studies, live demos that were showcased and speakers from both the companies delivered their views on how IoT helps businesses meet the changing needs and expectations of their customers which increase revenue, reduce operational cost-effectively.

During the roadshow, Mr. Veer Passi CEO, Kalaam Telecom said, “Kalaam realized very quickly over the last 3-4 years that traditional services have become a commodity and enterprises are looking at telecom infrastructure as value-added service on top of traditional services. We identified this need and took the lead in introducing Industrial IoT solutions in association with Altizon systems, USA being in the magic quadrant of Gartner. Today, businesses in various industries are realizing the benefits of IoT technology and it is expected to produce innovations leading to widespread societal change.”

Harish Kulkarni, Director Sales & Partnership, Altizon Systems who was also a speaker at the launch said, “We are delighted with the launch and to have associated with Kalaam Telecom. By combining our strengths, we aim to provide enterprises with new opportunities to unleash the power of IoT to drive significant competitive advantage.”

The Internet of Things offers greater promise as a truly disruptive technology and through the launch in Bahrain, Kalaam Telecom educated the attendees as to why IoT is one of the most exciting and innovative trends in the industry and also helped them experience the newest developments.

Bahrain, 15 May 2018 – Kalaam Telecom, one of the largest telecom service providers for the enterprise market in Bahrain, today announced its acquisition of Tawasul Telecom, a Kuwait-based Information and Communication Technology solutions provider. Tawasul has a strong network presence in the Middle East, UK and Singapore and offices in 5 countries.

Kalaam’s officials announced that they acquired 100% stake in Tawasul Telecom. The acquisition of Tawasul will further strengthen Kalaam’s position in the GCC and international market; thereby expanding its customers base geographically in the GCC and globally. This is the 3^rd acquisition for Kalaam over the past 4 years.

Kalaam Telecom is the first alternative telecom service provider that emerged following the liberalization of the telecom sector in Bahrain to successfully compete outside of its home market.

In a bid to meet increasing demand for ICT solutions and services, Kalaam Telecom devised ecosystem that provides businesses a comprehensive range of telecom and managed ICT solutions for its clients’ needs. Kalaam’s expertise and reach has allowed businesses to significantly reduce costs, increase productivity and improve overall efficiency.

Speaking about the acquisition at the press conference, Nezar Al Saie, Chairman of Kalaam Telecom, said, “This is a major milestone, a transformational step for Kalaam Telecom. Acquiring Tawasul is in line with our company’s vision of expanding regionally and internationally to further support the fast-growing telecom and ICT sector.”

Announcing the acquisition, Kalaam Telecom’s Chief Executive Officer, Veer Passi said, “Most enterprises today, are looking for a single solutions provider to meet all their communication needs.  With this acquisition, we will be equipped to meet those demands and will enable us to offer our customers easy-to-procure, fast and pan-GCC solutions over a single agreement. Our customers look to us for expertise, innovation, and managed services. We try to deliver on these expectations every time.”

Kalaam Telecom, one of the largest telecom operator for businesses in Bahrain, today announced the successful implementation of Infotainment and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) Solution for the Lagoona Beach Luxury Resort & Spa, one of the largest luxury hotel apartments in the Kingdom.  The all-new hospitality IPTV solution was developed after careful understanding of the hotel business requirements and challenges and intends to enhance the overall guest experience during their stay at the hotel.

It seamlessly provides multi-screen set-up and makes hotel information discovery, interactive and accessible from TV and Mobile devices easily. With the implemented Infotainment and IPTV Solution, the guests can now also request services from their mobile application within the hotel to shop items; book leisure activities; buy local tour packages; call a taxi from TV; chat with front desk; play games; browse the internet; or be connected to social media.

Not only is the Infotainment and IPTV Solution feature-rich but also assists the hotel to showcase their offers in an enhanced way. By using the Digital Signage solution, the hotel can now attract guest attention to new services and other amenities.

Another unique feature is the highly advanced request management and escalation system that helps the hotel to manage and monitor all guest related services and requests on a single panel and service them without delay.

Speaking about the implementation, Mr. Veer Passi, CEO, Kalaam Telecom said, “To meet the hospitality industry’s evolving guest demands, we are delighted to have offered an all – in – one infotainment and IPTV bespoke solution, that is customized in style and functionality to suit the property. The IPTV Solution will serve as a middleman to streamline a variety of tasks for the hotels. The guests too now have value features that entertain, inform, and enrich them in-stay experience.”

Lagoona Beach Luxury Resort & Spa Owner’s Representative, Mr. Irfan Sheikh stated, “The modern hotel guests expect connectivity and personalized entertainment experiences comparable to those they enjoy at home. With Kalaam Telecom’s IPTV Solution we found a system that ultimately benefits our guests—through improved operations. We hope to stand out by offering our guests a truly unique home-from-home in-room entertainment experience, promoting enhanced guest satisfaction and loyalty.”

Through the Infotainment and IPTV Solution, Kalaam Telecom extends flawless technology experience to the hotels. The Solution is integrated and certified with 20+ vendor systems, including many popular PMS, Point-of-Sale, Loyalty System, SPA Management, Bandwidth Manager, Room Control, Hotel Televisions, Workflow Management, Keyless Entry and many more.