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Affiliated Computer Services is to take over the running of Novell's data center operations in Provo, Utah as part of a global services deal which will see the outsourcer take Novell's data center products to market.
Under the IT outsourcing arrangement, around 150 Novell data center staff will move to ACS, including the infrastructure and application development and maintenance services operations. ACS will also take over Novell's global SAP roll out by providing consulting and applications development and system integration services in a $135 million, five-year contract.
Over the next three years ACS will purchase at least $30 million in Novell products and will enhance Novell's global data center operations
The agreement will see both companies partner up to go-to-market with data center solutions based around Novell products and ACS services with each promising to invest in joint engineering, technology, sales, and marketing initiatives. Novell hopes to gain access to ACS' experience and customer base.
"This is a significant partnership with one of the leading IT service providers in the world," said Ron Hovsepian, president and CEO of Novell. "ACS will benefit from leveraging Novell solutions to provide data centre services to its global clients, giving Novell a substantial new source of revenue and a new route to market. The IT outsourcing arrangement will also enable Novell to focus on its core business while giving the opportunity to substantially improve IT performance from both a financial and operational perspective."
Novell estimates that it will realise a significant cost saving on continuing IT related expenses over the five-year duration of the agreement, it said.
"This partnership will offer key, go-to-market differentiators for both Novell and ACS," said Lynn Blodgett, ACS president and CEO. "Two innovative technology enterprises are leveraging their capabilities to respond to their clients fluctuating business imperatives, enabling them to respond to their own customers demands quicker and to improve operational efficiency."
ACS will leverage Novell products to support the ACS Management Platform (AMP), the delivery platform for its portfolio of global IT outsourcing service offerings. ACS plans to enhance AMP with capabilities that support cloud computing, auto provisioning, and process automation. ACS will buy Novell technology in a number of areas including SUSE Linux Enterprise operating system, Platespin workload management, business service management, and identity and security solutions.
Keywords: Novell, SAP, outsourcing, data center, ACS | |
