EDS, an HP company, and insurance giant Aviva announced a 10-year, $1 billion (£700 million) data center services contract.
Under the terms of the agreement, signed last month, EDS will transform and manage two data centers for Aviva, the world's fifth largest insurer. 350 Aviva IT and data center staff will move over to EDS.
The data centers, located in Norwich, England, serve Aviva's businesses in the United Kingdom, India, France and Ireland.
"Partnering with EDS for data center services, in our view, supports Aviva's goals to improve flexibility, increase operational efficiency and lower costs," said Igal Mayer, UK general insurance Chief Executive Officer at Aviva. "After a thorough evaluation, we chose EDS over other global service providers because of its collaborative approach as well as its unmatched reliability, security and value."
EDS will provide Aviva with data center modernization services as well as management for the insurance firm's mainframe, midrange and Windows servers.
Approximately 300 Aviva employees will transfer to EDS to deliver these services. "The data center transformation will help Aviva increase efficiency, lower risk and reduce costs," said Bill Thomas, senior vice president for the Europe, Middle East and Africa region at EDS, an HP company. "As a trusted business ally, EDS will draw on its years of experience to help Aviva evolve its technology environment to drive better business outcomes."
HP and Cisco will provide select tools, technologies and resources to EDS in support of Aviva.