Infrastructure outsourcing market grows

Frost & Sullivan has found that the South African IT infrastructure outsourcing market earned between $2.78 billion and $3.5 billion in 2006 and has estimated that it will reach $5.6 billion in 2012, according to Newswire Today.

The SA IT infrastructure outsourcing market will continue to show good levels of growth and will need to focus on SMME requirements to effectively capitalise on existing opportunities.

"South Africa's IT infrastructure outsourcing market is expanding at a robust rate due to sustained economic growth," notes Frost & Sullivan research analyst, Lindsey Mc Donald. "The market is poised to experience fairly significant consolidation within the next five years."

Colombian airline Avianca has chosen IBM to manage and operate its information technology, in a deal valued at $12 million, reports MySolutionInfo

IBM will provide services, including administration of the airline's datacentre operations, end-user support services, including helpdesk and onsite support, inventory administration, network management, and support for mainframe and mid-range server systems.

By outsourcing these services to IBM, Avianca will ensure its IT operations are fully-supported while focusing on its core business operations.

The Australian Customs Service has finalised a five-year, $160 million mainframe outsourcing agreement with IBM as it scales back its relationship with EDS, reports AustralianIT

Customs has also been negotiating with Telstra and Cybertrust over telephony and security contracts respectively.

Under the $160 million contract, IBM will assume responsibility for Customs' main processing environment, which encompasses mainframe, mid-range and disaster recovery systems.