Government issues £300m IT services tender for education sector

Providers are expected to be able to supply a range of delivery models, IT solutions and services

The government has issued a £300m IT services tender for the education sector as part of a pan-government collaborative framework agreement.

The agreement, which replaces the Becta ICT services framework, has been put in place by the Crown Commercial Services (CCS) for use by UK public-sector bodies including central government departments and their arm's length bodies and agencies, non-departmental public bodies, NHS bodies and local authorities.

According to CCS, the public-sector bodies have a need for educational institutions or procurement authorities to obtain IT solutions and specialist educational ICT goods and services.

In the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) notice, CCS said that the new framework agreement would provide customers "with the capability to obtain ICT goods and services tailored for the specific needs of a diverse range of educational establishments".

Providers are expected to be able to supply a range of delivery models including supply and fit, support and maintenance, systems configuration and management, partial or fully managed ICT services and integration services.

The IT providers will also be expected to supply and integrate solutions into new infrastructure as well as legacy ICT environments that require integration and repurposing of existing IT.

CCS said that the IT solutions could include hardware, software, networks, peripheral equipment and end-user devices. It emphasises that fixed-line broadband connectivity is not within the scope of this procurement.

"It is expected that prospective customers will provision broadband connectivity separately via specialist providers," it said.

According to the notice, the framework agreement is for several different operators but the contract is not divided into lots.

The maximum number of participants to the framework agreement is 20 and the contract length is four years.