Industry news

ARK Schools have awarded Civica a five-year contract to provide a range of managed IT services including HR and Finance systems, server administration, storage and device management. ARK’s network of primary and secondary academies in the U.K holds 2,500 staff and 14,500 students. The deal aims to support the growth of ARK Schools while driving savings through efficiency.

Outsourcing company Civica acquire IT provider

In an aim to create a European leader in cloud computing, cybersecurity and Big Data, Atos has made a bid of £502m to buy Bull. Atos claims that its bid to buy Bull does not affect its current bid to buy Steria as well.

Bull, a French services company, has a current ten year contract worth £70m with Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council to manage their IT services. Signed in 2006, they formed a joint venture company to manage the contract with Barnsley.

Cloud resource exchange comes closer to launch

According to the Independent, government contractors have heavily criticised officials and ministers after plans to reform the £14bn budget agency that buys and looks after military kit - Defence Equipment & Support.

The MoD is introducing more limited reforms to have commercial companies run parts of the agency including IT and human resources. One of the fundamental deals is programme delivery which has been carved up into four along the lines of the three armed forces and combined command.

The Independent goes on to say that no one single company would be allowed to win more than two of the programme delivery contracts, resulting in major suppliers across the military requiring to deal with between two and four clients. There are several companies all in the running for the programme delivery roles including huge US project management conglomerates such as Bechtel, British engineering groups like WS Atkins, accountants and management consultants and it is this potential confusing structure that has met heavy criticism.

Despite efforts, plans failed to semi-privatise the Bristol-based DE&S last year leading this huge outsourcing deal to collapse.

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MoD procurement contract broken down for privatisation

According to a report carried out by Research and Markets (Dublin based business intelligence and market research company), the Global Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 23.12% over the period 2013-2018.

The massive availability of data is one factor that has enabled this growth as it needs to be analysed and processed. The KPO (Knowledge Process Outsourcing) market is also seeing the transformation of the industry into a consultative model. However rules set by various governments regarding legal and compliance clauses are one of the major challenges confronting this market.

The key vendors identified in the report as dominating this market included Evalueserve, Genpact Ltd., MphasiS, RR Donnelley & Sons Co. and Wipro Ltd. Other vendors mentioned included EXLService Holdings, Inc, Infosys Ltd and Aranca.

Based on an in-depth market analysis with inputs from industry experts, the Global Knowledge Process Outsourcing Market 2014-2018 report covers the Americas, EMEA and APAC regions.

Grant Thornton research finds 2 in 5 companies are open to outsourcing

The maritime unit of BAE Systems has signed a £60 – 70m contract with Capita for them to improve their IT services, which will be aligned with BAE Systems wider IT model. BAE Systems Maritime are currently building the Astute class of nuclear powered attack submarines for the Royal Navy, the hope it that with Capita on board it will reduce costs and increase performance. Capita IT Services has worked with BAE Systems for the past eight years on a number of projects.

Capita awarded contact centre contract by John Lewis

According to The Bookseller, the Conservative-run Kent County Council are considering outsourcing more than 90 libraries. They would still own the libraries but bodies such as trusts, arms-length companies and joint ventures would run them helping save on the £13m budget the council had for library and archive services this year.

The City of York implemented a similar scheme and their libraries are now run by a mutual benefit society (Explore York Libraries and Archives) supported by the council.

As it looks to make future savings, Kent County Council is currently undertaking a wholesale review of its services.

Cornwall Council leader Alec Robertson is to step down after a vote of no confidence

Global CEO of Aegis, Sandip Sen has commented on seeing a trend in more banks signing deals with Business process management companies. Just as the telecom industry expanded its BPO outsourcing in 2003-05 the banking sector is set to do the same overtaking the telecom sector as the largest buyers of BPO services. During 2003-05 India was adding six million customers a month with BPO and telecoms industries growing in line with each other. Today the banking sector has stepped into the spotlight as the biggest BPO growth industry.

India losing 70 per cent of voice and call centre business to competitors according to report

According to data compiled by research firm Porge and analysed by Local Government Chronicle (LGC), there is a tenfold different in the amount council spend per head of population on outsourced services.

After analysing figures from a database of councils’ 2012 – 2013 published receipts for expenditure over £500, it indicates a huge gulf spent by top-tier council with organisations in the private, public and voluntary sectors. According to their analysis, it shows councils spent £30.5bn with outside providers in 2012-13. The data took into account classic outsourcing expenditure such as waste contracts as well as capital schemes such as house building and payments to financial institutions.

£165 million worth of savings expected from Barnet’s “easyCouncil” outsourcing deals

Islington council is developing a new programme to cut down on their outsource spend. The plan is to recruit new graduates and pair them with skilled IT workers to learn from with the hope that they will eventually be able to take control of digital services. This comes after an executive review of the councils commissioning, procurement and contract management found that a number of outsourced agency staff at project management level were earning equal to the chief officers.

£165 million worth of savings expected from Barnet’s “easyCouncil” outsourcing deals

A National model for IT procurement has been announced for local government. The model has been adapted from the successful London ICT Project which has been run in 33 local authorities in London since 2012. The new strategy addresses issues brought forward from Heads of ICT, Procurement, House of Commons and Office of Fair Trading reports and acts to deliver savings and efficiencies to deliver an improved service.

The Local Government ICT plan is working with the National ICT Category Management Programme (NICTMP) to support local government to procure the technology systems and equipment cost effectively in order to deliver an improved value for money service.

Local authorities failing to collaborate on procurement