Sanlam has awarded a R1.2 billion outsourcing contract to debis IT Services SA, a subsidiary of the German debis Systemhaus. Debis will absorb Sanlam`s IT staff and acquire all IT infrastructure.
The parent company, itself a wholly-owned subsidiary of Daimler Chrysler, will co-sign the contract.
Debis SA was created as a joint venture with Denel in 1997. Denel has since withdrawn, selling its stake to the German parent.
The Sanlam contract will run for five years and includes management of the mainframe, servers and telephony. Management of desktops will be sub-contracted to Spicer Specialised Services, which has held that contract for some time.
Sanlam will only retain responsibility for IT strategy and further research. The 230 employees in the Sanlam IT department will join debis, and Patrick Neale-May, the head of the department, says employees see it as an opportunity to advance their careers. "Staff had sufficient opportunities to participate in the process to arrive at the decision to outsource and are satisfied with the outcome," he says.
The Sanlam computer centre will become debis` main data centre in the Western Cape and network infrastructure is to be integrated with the existing debis value-added network.
"The implementation and transition process is in full swing and is scheduled for completion during the next few months," says Jan van der Merwe, GM of sales and service and debis SA. He believes the support of the parent company helped to clinch the deal.
Debis IT Services is represented throughout Europe and has offices in Brazil, the US and Russia.
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