BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Aug. 10, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Frost & Sullivan awarded CenturyLink, Inc. (NYSE: CTL) its prestigious 2020 Best Practices Award for Innovation Excellence, recognizing CenturyLink for its Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) strong performance and effective strategy in the Latin America and Caribbean market.

Points to note from Frost & Sullivan's analysis:

• Companies are realizing the benefits of cloud-based models, OPEX and CAPEX benefits, the scalability and flexibility that allows organizations to increase or decrease the number of resources consumed on a per-month basis, improved security and reliability, faster deployment times, and low-risk options when experimenting with new technologies.
• The Latin American and Caribbean UCaaS market continues its path to the cloud and is exhibiting double-digit growth rates.
• Digital transformation continues to be a key organizational goal for Latin American businesses, it is crucial to address challenges such as finding suitable, cost-effective network services that can seamlessly integrate the various technology platforms, applications, and services a business uses, especially during the global pandemic.
• Customer expectations currently evolving. Organizations are demanding new and more advanced UC&C capabilities as well as tighter integration between their communications systems and other business applications. Many customers face big decisions when it comes to IT investments that will support their digital transformation and communications initiatives. CenturyLink has significant experience in managing complex hybrid and multi-cloud environments, and many of its deployments include a great deal of premises-based legacy PBX/PSTN services integration, to protect existing investments in enterprise communications systems.

While the negative effects of the expected economic downturn might lead some organizations to postpone investments in ICT solutions, organizations such as CenturyLink, are quickly realizing the importance of having solid cloud-based tools—these tools allow them to effectively support remote work while improving employee productivity, augmenting business agility, improving employee and customer experience, and accelerating time to market.

"After our in-depth analysis built on a 360-degree research with objective rating of companies in the hosted IP Telephony and UCaaS Latin American and Caribbean market, Frost & Sullivan firmly believes CenturyLink is one of the top providers in a unique position to guarantee those key functionalities and leverage them to fuel both growth and innovation," said Sebastian Menutti, Industry Principal for Frost & Sullivan. "The company is a digital transformation enabler and advisor for its customers, providing strict SLAs, and owning the customer relationship by providing a single-pane-of-glass IT solution."

"CenturyLink is committed to partnering with Latin American businesses to achieve their technological goals, helping them surpass this global pandemic challenge and continue on their digital transformation journeys," said Leonardo Barbero, product senior vice president for CenturyLink Latin America "Enterprises are facing an ever-changing technology landscape, with high-capacity demands, security concerns, and the need to migrate to new platforms. This recognition by Frost & Sullivan validates our efforts to deliver a simple enterprise user experience with sophisticated capabilities and reinforces CenturyLink's ongoing leadership in delivering a wide range of services that meet our customers' needs, all while providing a high level of service."

Key Facts:

• The criteria used to gauge CenturyLink's performance against competitors in the Innovation Excellence Award category include two key factors: growth performance and innovation.
• CenturyLink's value-added services, reinforced by its innovative solutions, position the company as a best-in-class leader in Latin America.
• CenturyLink offers a range of services, including Unified Communications and Collaboration, Cloud PBX, SD-WAN, CDN, WAN optimization and network management, all backed by a superior network infrastructure, thereby allowing the company to satisfy the region's unmet market needs.
• CenturyLink received the 2018 Frost & Sullivan Award for Competitive Strategy Innovation and Leadership in the MPLS/IP-VPN Services Market.
• CenturyLink received the 2018 North America Product Leadership Award from Frost & Sullivan for its Cloud Application Manager platform.
• Frost & Sullivan recognized CenturyLink as the Asia-Pacific Hybrid IT Service Provider of the Year for the fourth consecutive year.
• In 2019 Frost & Sullivan recognized CenturyLink with the Latin American Enterprise Services Provider Company of the Year Award, award also received in 2018 and 2016.

About the Award:

• Frost & Sullivan is an international consulting company dedicated to helping clients accelerate growth and achieve best-in-class positions in innovation and leadership.
• Frost & Sullivan's Radar is a robust analytical tool that benchmarks companies' innovation focus and growth performance in a given market.
• Frost & Sullivan industry analysts compare market participants and measure performance through in-depth interviews, analysis, and extensive secondary research to identify best practices.

About CenturyLink
CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL) is a technology leader delivering hybrid networking, cloud connectivity, and security solutions to customers around the world. Through its extensive global fiber network, CenturyLink provides secure and reliable services to meet the growing digital demands of businesses and consumers. CenturyLink strives to be the trusted connection to the networked world and is focused on delivering technology that enhances the customer experience. Learn more at http://news.centurylink.com/

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