Credit: Pxfuel

Local authorities across Cheshire have signed a £35m long-term deal for the delivery of Microsoft cloud services.

A procurement exercise led by Cheshire East council has appointed the UK arm of US-headquartered IT reseller Insight to a six-year contract that came into effect on 9 December. The deal also covers the supply of services to Cheshire West and Chester Council.

Insight has been appointed to support a long-term scheme dedicated to the adoption of software- and platform-as-a-service tools in Microsoft environment.

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“The programme is to adopt and consume Microsoft Azure SaaS/PaaS and other cloud-hosted services and products,” according to procurement documents.

The contract-award notice indicates that the engagement – which lasts until December 2026 – will cover existing and new services.

“Both Cheshire East and Cheshire West & Chester Councils continue to invest in ICT services which will continue to migrate core applications into an Azure cloud environment through engagement with our strategic cloud enablement partner – Microsoft,” it said.