A government procurement agency has signed a 105 million contract extension to continue providing telecoms services for 125,000 public sector employees.
The deal means telecoms firm Global Crossing will continue to operate as the main contractor for the Office of Government Commerce's OGCbuying.solutions managed telecommunications services (Mts) agreement, which supports some 90 public sector bodies across local government, education, health and justice.
The original Mts, signed in 1996, had Global Crossing providing voice and data network services to public sector bodies. Following the contract extension, which runs to 2011, Global Crossing will extend the services to include hosted IP telephony and mobile working services.
"These capabilities use new technology to drive efficiency savings, as well as enable and support secure, mobile and flexible working," said Anthony Christie, managing director for UK and Europe.
Siemens Enterprise Communications, one of Global Crossing's technology partners, said the agreement will help the UK's public sector move toward more flexible working.
"The public sector is leading the way on flexible working in the UK and should be a source of considerable envy for our private sector counterparts," said David Leighton, public sector director at Siemens Enterprise Communications, in a statement.
