The State of Ohio has given IBM a US$267m 10-year contract to modernize the State of Ohio Computing Center (SOCC) through development of a private-cloud computing environment and the use of other hardware, software and services from IBM.

“We are working with IBM to significantly reduce the complexity of our infrastructure, improve data center operations and increase service delivery for state agencies and the constituents they serve," Stu Davis, Ohio's CIO, said. “This is a foundational component of Ohio’s IT Optimization efforts that will result in savings and culminate in the consolidation of the state’s IT assets into a primary state data center.”

The SOCC includes four floors and more than 350,000 sq ft of space. It houses infrastructure for several state agencies that support more than 1,600 applications running on more than 2,700 servers in a complex network environment.

It costs the state US$108m a year to operate these resources. The goal of the consolidation project is to substantially reduce IT infrastructure services spend and reallocate those funds to applications and services that support the state's citizens and businesses.

IBM's tasks will include reducing power and cooling requirements of the facility, moving infrastructure and application workloads within the facility, implementing operating-model improvements and providing ongoing services in a “co-managed arrangement with state staff.”