BP picks EDS for worldwide IT services

British Petroleum (BP) has completed the final leg of its IT outsourcing process, with the announcement of a £300m contract award to EDS. Over the next 18 months, EDS will replace BP's three existing suppliers as sole worldwide provider of PCs, Windows NT servers and LAN equipment.

BP's Common Operating Environment is currently outsourced to IBM, Sema and SEIC. The latest contract is unlikely to cause job losses, according to BP spokesman, Ian Stewart. "There is not much left in-house now," he told Silicon News. "We have outsourced a lot of our IT over the past few years."

EDS, one of the UK's largest providers of IT services, won the deal because of its strong global presence. "EDS has already set up global processes, with a high quality of service," said Stewart. IBM was a close contender for the five-year contract.

EDS will start the contract in the UK, where it will supply BP with over 13,000 desktop computers. The full roll-out, across 142 countries, will get underway in 2000. As well as supplying computer hardware, EDS will set up a call centre in Durham, UK, where BP employees will be able to get IT support.

Next year, BP plans to merge with US oil group, Amoco, which currently runs its IT services from a centralised helpdesk. "We dial the same internal number from anywhere in the world and chat to IT support, while they access our system," one employee told Silicon News.

An EDS spokeswoman said it is too early to say whether the BP contract will be extended to replace Amoco's existing infrastructure if the merger goes ahead.