The Group 8 cluster of federal agencies that signed a collective IT outsourcing arrangement with Commander-owned Volante in 2000 are moving on as the contract nears its end on 26 June.
There were a lot of criticisms that [Group 8] was attempting a one size fits all model, which very quickly become dysfunctional
Ovum's Steve Hodgkinson
Group 8 is unofficially dead, with each agency under the deal now in the process of entering discrete arrangements with separate suppliers.
The company that now stands to lose the Group 8 work is Darwin-based IT services firm, CSG, which acquired Commander's Volante contracts following its demise.
The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF) last month was the first to officially replace CSG with the now HP-owned EDS.
A spokesperson for DAFF said the public tender for the delivery of IT managed services including help desk, desktop, mid-range servers, LAN and storage management (worth $96 million over five years) was inked with EDS on 24 March.
Other agencies that were formerly part of Group 8 included the Australian Media and Communications Authority; Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA); and Department of the Environment Water, Heritage and the Arts (DEWHA).
ACMA's procurement plan stated it would release a request for tender in August for a new contract to succeed the existing desktop, LAN and help desk services. The agency was unable to respond to ZDNet.com.au's questions about its plans at the time of writing.
CASA was in the final stages of determining a new supplier for the provision of managed support services for its ICT environment, according to a CASA spokesperson. That deal covers desktop and laptop, mid-range servers and storage area networks as well as help desk, field support and "cross platform services".
CASA declined to confirm whether Western Australian IT services firm ASG had won the contract, as suggested by some in the industry.
One of the largest deals to rise from the Group 8 grave is that of the Department of the Environment, Heritage and the Arts (DEWHA), which late last year held an industry briefing for the contract to manage its IT infrastructure, which covers 3200 users, 300 PCs, 400 laptops, 400 networked printers and 150 servers.
DEWHA is believed to have awarded its contract to IT outsourcing company, Datacom, however, spokespeople were unable to comment on the outcome.
"The process of evaluation is currently underway. Details will only be provided once the agreement has been finalised," the spokesperson told ZDNet.com.au.
Ovum's government technology analyst, Steve Hodgkinson, told ZDNet.com.au that the demise of Group 8 acknowledged IT outsourcing in this way doesn't work.
"This style of arrangement is known to be not a good way to do [outsourcing]. At the time, what they ended up with was quite contentious. There were a lot of criticisms that [Group 8] was attempting a one size fits all model, which very quickly become dysfunctional," said Hodgkinson.
While the Gershon review has sought ICT arrangements that delivered scale benefits, such as the whole-of-government Microsoft licensing deal, those type of arrangements were too complex to apply to IT outsourcing, such as that attempted under Group 8 in 2000.
"I don't think anyone would want to make those same mistakes and railroad everyone into those contracts. Those service deals [are] too complex to look at in a Gershon context," said Hodgkinson.
I think DAFF are in for an rude and expensive shock. They have no idea what they will be in for when dealing with a tier 1 multinational.