Ericsson has signed a five-year IT outsourcing deal with
Hewlett-Packard.
Under the terms of the contract, HP will take over
responsibility for Ericsson's IT infrastructure in 100 countries,
standardise the company's desktop environment and provide data
centre management and help desk support, according to Juergen
Rottler, vice president, HP Services.
Rottler said that beginning next month, 1,000 employees of
Ericsson's global IT services division, as well as certain assets,
will be transferred to HP. The deal is still subject to regulatory
approval.
Although the companies have not released financial details,
Rottler said the contract is the largest outsourcing deal in
Sweden's history.
However, Rottler said HP will not take over Ericsson's
information systems operations, which include application
development, implementation and management.
"Outsourcing of IT operations is part of Ericsson's changes
within the IS/IT area and its overall restructuring program, which
is aimed at radically reducing the operating expenses and cost of
sales," said Per-Arne Sandstrom, Ericsson's deputy chief executive
officer.
Linda Rosencrance writes for Computerworld