Scottish Parliament outsources IT support

The Scottish Parliament has today signed a contract to outsource its IT support to LogicaCMG in a deal worth an estimated £17.5 million over the next 10 years.

The five-year outsourcing contract (with the option to extend it annually for another five years), which is valued at £1.75 million a year, is due to commence in January 2008 and will be paid for using the Parliament's existing budgets. It replaces a similar seven-year contract with Wipro Technologies.

The contract primarily covers system integration, support and administration for the organisation at constituency and regional levels from its Holyrood base and will be facilitated from Logica's Scottish offices as a managed service.

The Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB) who approved the contract said £1.1 million of the deal would cover support for core IT-based services such as IT security, network support, systems installation and maintenance each year. The remainder will provide the scope to give the organisation access to a wider range of services to meet future needs, providing business consultancy services on IT-based business improvement projects, including the potential to deliver future technology updates.

Paul Grice, the Parliament's chief executive said the contract represents a 35 per cent saving on current, core IT support service costs, adding that the new deal "underscores the Parliament's commitment to use public funds as cost effectively as possible".

"We were looking for proven ability to manage our existing services and also the capability to support our future technology needs," he added.

The announcement comes after an 18-month tender process involving interest from 32 suppliers, which Logica said helped assure the Parliament of the long-term viability of products and services used as part of the contract. And both parties have signed a 'Partnering Principles,' charter-type agreement assuring this will be the case for the next five to 10 years.

Image: Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body - 2007.

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