BT Groupplc (NYSE:BT-message board; London: BTA) announced another solid quarter today, reporting revenues of £5 billion (US$10.28 billion) for the three months to June 30, with continued growth in what it calls its "New Wave" products -- networked IT services for corporate customers, broadband, and mobility. (See BT Posts Q1 Results.)

    Of greater interest, though, was BT's chat around a few key topics -- Google, IPTV, and next-generation high-speed access.

    During his presentation, BT's CEO Ben Verwaayen referred to an unannounced new deal with Google (Nasdaq: GOOG - message board), which caught the attention of analysts at the carrier's earnings presentation in London.

    During the question-and-answersession, he revealed that Google is a conferencing services customer, along with other big-name corporates such as Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO - message board), Intel Corp. (Nasdaq: INTC - message board), Coca-Cola, and PepsiCo, though BT declines to provide any further details.

    "Competitors are often our customers or partners… That's all part of being a grown-up company," he stated. "Google is going to be all these things."

    BT has talked before about Google's potential to be a customer as well as a rival, with senior management hinting in past briefings that Google is the type of company that could be targeted with new wholesale products based around bandwidth and QOS guarantees.

    The notion that Google could also be a partner has also been raised before, and Verwaayen stressed today the importance of partnerships and creating an "open culture" at BT that can learn from other non-telecom companies, a topic CTO Matt Bross also touched on this summer when talking about the potential of Web 2.0 application developments. (See Carriers Surf the Web 2.0 Wave.)