Credit: Steve Bulley/Pixabay

The Bank of England has signed a multimillion-pound deal with a tech provider that will deliver a comprehensive range of IT goods and services over the coming years.

The national central bank signed a three-year deal with IT reseller Softcat on 8 July, according to newly released procurement information. The engagement will be worth £45m to the Marlow-headquartered firm.

The contract-award notice indicates that the Bank of England was seeking to appoint a single “partner to bring together the capability of purchasing hardware, software and the provision of associated services including support services”.

“This includes the management of hardware such as extended product warranties; support; upgrade and maintenance services associated with goods purchased,” it added.

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The bank indicated that, by signing a comprehensive deal to cover all its tech needs, it hoped to derive benefits including “improved margins [and a] competitively priced professional services rate card”.

The deal is also expected to ensure a “compliant route to market for product and services which can only be sourced with a reseller” – rather than directly from the product manufacturer.

Other advantages offered by the contract include ongoing management of supplier relationships, instead of making one-off reactive purchase. A “commercial contracts manager [will also be] provided to ease internal burden of call-off contract processing,” the notice said.

With annual sales of close to £2bn, Softcat is the UK’s largest IT reseller. It works with a huge range of public-sector entities, with big contract wins this year including a £10m software licensing deal with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, a £5m contract to provide laptops to the Ministry of Justice, and a £15m engagement to provide the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency with all of its non-Microsoft software products.