Four of five suppliers picked for four year framework are headquartered in Scotland, and will deliver public, private and hybrid cloud services to a comprehensive range of public sector organisations

The Scottish Government has favoured locally based suppliers in a new multimillion-pound framework covering the delivery or cloud services to public-sector bodies across the country.

Five suppliers have been confirmed for a four-year cloud services framework. Four of these companies – DataVita, BrightSolid, iomart, and Storm ID – are headquartered in Scotland. The fifth company to win a place, Softcat, is headquartered in Buckinghamshire, but runs a Scottish operation from a Glasgow office.

An estimated £20m will be spent with these companies over the coming years.

Services offered by the framework will include: platform- and infrastructure-as-a-service offerings; co-location or hosting; public, private, and hybrid cloud; migration services.

Software-as-a-service offerings are not covered by the framework as they are addressed by other procurement vehicles, according to the contract-award notice.

The contract-award notice said: “The key aims of the framework are to deliver efficient access to cloud services to the Scottish public sector offering value for money, in a safe, secure and environmentally friendly way.”

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The framework is available for use by a comprehensive range of public sector bodies and charities operating across Scotland. The deal came into effect at the start of this month and runs until 2027.

The Scottish Government had previously indicated that up to eight suppliers would be awarded a spot on the framework. Ten firms ultimately submitted a bid for a place, of which half were successful.

Three of the suppliers featured run their own datacentres in Scotland, with DataVita operating a facility at its headquarters in the village of Chapelhall and another in Glasgow city centre. Iomart also runs a facility in Glasgow – as one of its 13 locations around the UK – while BrightSolid runs datacentres in Aberdeen and Dundee.

Edinburgh-based digital consultancy Storm ID, meanwhile, offers cloud services from Microsoft. Softcat is the UK’s largest IT reseller, offering services from an extensive range of vendors.