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back to article UK.gov pops lid off £700m barrel of non-Cloudable hosting pork

The Cabinet Office is seeking a joint venture partner to help it tackle what it describes as one of the most costly areas of public sector tech – hosting. Crown Hosting (CHS), along with Government Digital Services, is hunting for a "private sector partner" to take a minimum 75 per cent stake in a joint venture vehicle to …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    £70M for (now did I read this right 550 1U servers) so about 15 cab's worth allowing for network kit, etc We just built a brand new data centre with 24 cabinets for less than £500k And we have some spare space if they're interested

    1 0 Reply
    1. phil dude
      Reply Icon
      Joke

      but this is govt....

      Budget management 101: Spending someone elses money on someone else, who gives a f**k?

      P.

      3 0 Reply
    2. Tom 38
      Reply Icon

      Even taking the low end of the billable, it's still over £9k per 1U server per year.

      2 1 Reply
      1. Richard 26
        Reply Icon

        'Even taking the low end of the billable, it's still over £9k per 1U server per year.'

        It's more reasonable if you take the projected number of servers (3 750), rather than the initial 550 though, or some sort of weighted average of the two. Throw in a minimum of 4 (n+1) redundant data centres, and the price is starting to look better.

        0 0 Reply
        1. Sir Runcible Spoon
          Reply Icon

          Do these cost projections included secured data feeds into the DC? VPN equipment, maintenance agreements/support, infrastructure design etc.?

          It all sounds a bit too reasonable for a 4 year period if you ask me.

          1 0 Reply
        2. Anonymous Coward
          Reply Icon
          Anonymous Coward

          It's more reasonable if -- @Richard 26

          But if they are using the "Aircraft Carrier Procurement" methodology ...

          Only 400 of the initial 550 will have to be supplied actually working. Additional funds (approx 30%) will be made available for the other 150. The "room for growth" requirement for the other 3200 boxes can be "forgotten" -- future expansion costs can be subject to future negotiations. There is always small print get-out clauses so that any failures and liabilities are always the fault of, and responsibility of the taxpayer; they voted for it. High level negotiations will be lengthy, and held at expensive, sunny resorts with family and friends accommodation provided by the contractor.

          [missing the joke's on the taxpayer icon]

          0 0 Reply
  2. Shady
    Trollface

    I've got a reseller account

    I can sort 'em out, and salt away a decent profit

    1 0 Reply
  3. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    So how many data centres does the UK government actually have?

    IIRC it was a figure of about 120.

    Perhaps it's time the UK government tried to reduce the number of data centres it has?

    0 0 Reply

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