BIS awards Thales five-year PSN contract

Thales has won a five-year government contract to provide network solutions to The Insolvency Service.

The deal was awarded by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) – the government segment responsible for insolvency services – through the public services network (PSN) framework, which aims to provide a central hub from which public sector organisations can source their communication services and cut costs.

The main responsibility of Thales will be to deploy a new secure wide area network for The Insolvency Service, covering its headquarters, regional offices and datacentres. This will mean network services for 35 locations across the UK, affecting 2,100 employees.

It is the first IL3 contract awarded by the PSN – defined by how much the organisation will be affected if compromised on a scale of zero to six.

Thales will also be tasked with migrating from the existing infrastructure and providing support after the move.

“Thales has invested heavily in developing our PSN offers over the past 12 months,” said Sam Keayes, vice-president of security and consulting at Thales. “Securing this contract has given us a good foundation to win future business.”

The Cabinet Office confirmed the 29 companies whose services were accredited for the PSN framework back in June 2012. Other big names included BT, EE, Virgin Media Business and Vodafone.