Web hosting firm Rackspace has won a contract worth several
million pounds to host external websites for the
British Army,
Royal Navy and
Royal Air Force.
The deal follows an earlier contract with Rackspace from 2004 to
host the
army's
recruitment website and
ArmyNet, the military's
online social networking service.
The new deal consolidates web hosting for the other two
services, saving the Ministry of Defence (MoD) around 26% in total
costs in the process, said Fabio Torlini, marketing director of
Rackspace.
Fabio Torlini said the deal did not include the military's
operational or in-theatre communications, although frontline troops
have access to ArmyNet.
ArmyNet carries news about sports, associations, museums, health
and safety, as well as a Twitter feed for breaking non-operational
news to tens of thousands of servicemen and women.
Torlini said Rackspace had set up a dedicated secure virtualised
server and storage system for the services.