Viglen has signed a £16m, three-year contract to provide IT
equipment and services to small primary schools in Northern
Ireland.
The announcement follows the collapse of last year's deal with IT
supplier RM that left the province's IT education initiative in
disarray.
In January 2001, after 18 months of negotiations, RM pulled out of
a £300m, 10-year contract to provide ICT to all of Northern
Ireland's 1,227 schools.
Following the failure, the Northern Ireland Classroom 2000 Project
was divided into five lots, with Viglen winning Lot 1 to provide
equipment for small primary schools.
Viglen, a subsidiary of Learning Technology, will supply hardware
and services to 574 schools, and 20 training and support
centres.
Viglen will deliver 5,200 workstations and 600 servers, working in
partnership on a year-long roll-out with Northern Ireland's local
service provider, Sx3.
The company will also provide ClassLink 2000, the latest network
administration and teaching software solution built on Microsoft
Windows 2000 technology.
Jimmy Stewart, project director for Classroom 2000, said: "We
awarded the contract to Viglen as we knew that they would be able
to act as a one-stop shop, providing us with a full cost-effective
and flexible solution.
"We were confident that they could take over the management,
support, maintenance, development and other issues associated with
the technology."