Government agency responsible for criminal prosecutions has retained existing reseller to fulfil an engagement until 2028, in a deal that is intended to provide ‘continuity’ and access to new tech

The Crown Prosecution Service has awarded a near-£20m deal covering the provision of core Microsoft licences over the coming years – as well as the implementation of the vendor’s artificial intelligence Copilot tool.

On 1 October, the CPS entered into a three-year agreement with specialist software reseller Trustmarque. The contract follows on directly from another 36-month engagement between the two parties, which came into effect in 2022.

That outgoing deal was valued at £10.2m while the new arrangement’s worth is pegged at £19.6m, according to a newly published commercial notice.

This significant increase in price tag can seemingly be attributed, in part, to the addition of new AI technologies – alongside the widely used core productivity tools typically covered by the Enterprise agreements offered by Microsoft to large business and government customers.

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“This requirement is for a three-year contract for a Microsoft Enterprise Licensing Agreement and Copilot Contract commencing from Wednesday 1 October 2025,” the notice said. “This procurement is needed to allow for continuity of service for Microsoft licences and rollout of Microsoft Copilot. These software licences are subscription-based and impact delivery of all operational and business activities and our ability to support the criminal justice system.”

Copilot has been widely trialled across government over the past couple of years, including a major exercise  – led by the Government Digital Service – in which 20,000 employees across 12 departments piloted the software earlier this year. The initiative found that the AI technology enabled civil servants to save an average of about half an hour a day, with “results [that] were consistent across grades and professions”.

However, a more recent trial in which 1,000 employees at the Department for Business and Trade used Copilot found that the Microsoft program saved time for most users – but did not deliver productivity gains, according to the department’s analysis.