The UK government has extended its G-Cloud procurement framework by six months, increasing the existing contracts by £1.65 billion ($2.2bn) in total.

G-Cloud is a procurement framework used by the UK public sector, enabling the purchasing of cloud computing services under predefined arrangements.

As reported by The Register, the current iteration of the framework - G-Cloud 14 - began in October 2024 and was originally set to run for 18 months, ending towards the end of April 2026. This has since been updated, with a new end date of October 2026.

Split into four "lots," lots one to three were worth £6.5bn ($8.65bn) in total, and lot four was worth £1bn ($1.33bn). The extension has added £650m ($865m) for lots one to three, and a further £1bn for lot four.

No explanation for the extension has been provided, beyond the extension notices stating: "The extension will facilitate the procurement of G-Cloud 15."

The G-Cloud 15 framework kicked off earlier this year with a pipeline notice published in April. Similarly set to last for 18 months, that framework had an estimated total value of £4.8 billion ($6.39bn) excluding VAT.

The main winners of the G-Cloud frameworks are typically the US hyperscalers, including Microsoft and Amazon Web Services (AWS). In December 2024, the Crown Commercial Service increased its cloud hosting deal with AWS by 89 percent mid-contract.

The cloud provider has previously won contracts with UK government departments, including the UK Health and Care Institute, the Home Office, the Department of Work and Pensions, the Competition and Markets Authority, and Defra.

The Register has previously reported that the UK government struggles with "vendor lock-in." A document from the Cabinet Office's Central Digital & Data Office - which is now part of the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology - stated that the current cloud adoption strategy risks "concentration and vendor lock-in that inhibit UK government's negotiating power over the cloud vendors."

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is expected to publish the findings of its Cloud Services Market Investigation in the coming weeks, which will include looking at the issue of vendor lock-in. During the course of its investigation, the CMA doubled its spend with AWS, committing to a three-year contract.

In recent months, Google Cloud has signed an agreement with the UK government to help it reduce its reliance on legacy technology. Google Cloud will, under the partnership, help government agencies to leave "ball and chain" technology contracts, which are making it difficult to move data to modern systems, and adopt Google's "secure-by-design" cloud technology.

The UK government's reliance on US big tech has been heavily criticized. Speaking on the recent Google deal, Civo CEO Mark Boost commented: “Digital transformation shouldn’t come with unanswered questions about data sovereignty. 

“This new partnership positions Google Cloud at the heart of the UK’s digital infrastructure, despite being governed by the US CLOUD Act. Under this legislation, government data, even if data is hosted in the UK, could still be accessed by US authorities if stored on Google’s platform."

The US hyperscalers, including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, and Google, have made various efforts to reassure European customers about commitments to data sovereignty. Despite this, earlier this month, Microsoft France's legal director, Anton Carniax, conceded under oath that the company couldn't guarantee that French citizens' data would never be transmitted to US authorities without explicit French authorization.