BT Wins Another Big IT Service Deal

British Telecom (BT (News - Alert)) has signed a £160 million deal to manage the networked IT service of U.K.’s reputed Nationwide Building Society. The agreement will see the telecoms company install and run Nationwide’s telephone, Internet and data systems, and take over its third party network contracts.

 

As part of the contract, BT will consolidate Nationwide’s multiple networks onto its 21CN Global network, supporting both voice and data services on a single converged platform. BT will also deliver enhanced remote access facilities to Nationwide’s mobile employees.

 

The so-called service transformation program is aimed at ensuring what it calls “cost predictability’.

 

For BT, the deal is the latest in a long list of IT contracts that it won from financial companies like Alliance & Leicester, Bradford and Bingley and Barclays.

 

Traditionally, Nationwide has developed and managed its IT operations in-house and procured point solutions from external suppliers. This agreement marks a shift towards a preference for a multi-sourcing model for IT services that can provide Nationwide with a reduced overall service cost and with improved service flexibility.

 

“Nationwide’s growth in recent years has meant that our IT infrastructure has also had to evolve at an exponential rate to keep up with demand,” explained Peter Stafford, Nationwide’s Head of IT Infrastructure.

 

Earlier this year Nationwide inked a deal to migrate its banking, savings and mortgage operations to the SAP (News - Alert) for Banking platform as part of a £300 million business transformation program.

 

François Barrault, CEO, BT Global Services (News - Alert), said: “BT will build on its unrivalled track record in providing transformational network centric outsourced solutions which meet the demands of the financial services industry.”

 

As recently as a week ago, BT won a similar deal in German market.