Gas and engineering company, The Linde Group (formerly Linde AG), has inked a three year A$17 million WAN services contract with Orange Business Services to connect 350 locations across the Asia Pacific region and Europe.

Linde wanted to optimise its infrastructure by consolidating multiple providers and create a homogeneous, flexible and scalable network.

The company required a cost-efficient MPLS-based network capable of supporting twice the current bandwidth volumes, while guaranteeing three classes of service for traffic prioritisation. Future plans for the network include voice and video.

The global WAN network provided by Orange Business Services consists of an adaptive IP VPN, using MPLS as a transmission network, combined with other access technologies, including DSL, conventional local access options and dial-up access.

Orange Business Services' geographical coverage, infrastructure and staff will enable the Linde Group to offer standardised services in all countries where it does business.

The customised solution, which is the result of an RFP issues last year, supports Linde's international growth plans.

Orange Business Services CEO, Frank Sommerfeld, said it won the deal against strong international competitors.

"It underscores once again the effectiveness of our strategy to offer standardized, high-quality and customized communication solutions," he said.

"For leading global companies, scalability, availability and flexibility are paramount, as is an attractive price-performance ratio."

The Linde Group has around 49,000 employees working in more than 70 countries worldwide. Orange is the key brand of France Telecom, which serves more than 163 million customers in five continents (220 countries or territories).