Virgin offers businesses 3G “insurance” for internet outages

Virgin Media Business is offering businesses 3G as “insurance” in case fixed internet connections go down.

For companies worried about productivity falling during internet outages, 3G back-up could be enough to keep up and running, Virgin said.

“The new product acts as a form of insurance for the enterprise, by using wireless 3G connectivity as a backup if the traditional wired network was to fail,” the company said.

“Traditionally, businesses have used a second wired connection to kick-in if their first fails. For this approach to work, the secondary connection needs to be completely separate to the first. A mobile 3G access provides just that.”

The new product – dubbed IPVPN 3G – run alongside the company’s existing IPVPN connections, kicking in if a wired connection fails. Virgin Media didn’t disclose the downtime suffered on its own network, which would provide more perspective on the value of the 3G back-up.

According to the company, workers within the corporate network would not notice any difference in connection quality due to deals with 3G companies to provide backhaul, but we’re still waiting to hear back from Virgin on how the company would provide enough bandwidth for offices with a large staff and what service level speeds it would guarantee.

Customers would need Virgin’s 3G-enabled router to access the service, and Virgin said prices would be provided on demand for individual companies, depending on their requirements and size.

The service is also being touted as a way for businesses to connect remote offices that fall outside wired broadband networks.