ING picks suppliers for €800m IT deal

Dutch banking group ING is outsourcing its European desktop installation, maintenance and support in a deal worth around €800m.

ING has signed a memorandum of understanding with preferred suppliers Accenture, Atos Origin, Getronics and KPN for the five-year deal, which is expected to be finalised by the end of 2006.

The bank said around 550 staff in Belgium and the Netherlands will transfer from ING to the preferred suppliers.

The full scope of the deal will cover the installation, maintenance and support of desktop PCs, laptops, printers and telephones for 53,000 ING employees in Europe. The outsourcing plans are part of ING's cost-cutting "operations and IT efficiency programme" to save €190m by 2008.

ING said it is using a new "third generation" outsourcing model whereby all the preferred suppliers have individual contracts with the bank, with the integrator holding responsibility for the co-ordination of the service provision and the alignment between demand and supply.

But Dominique Raviart, analyst at Ovum, said in a briefing note: "This sounds ambitious or even mysterious but we suspect it is more a fine-tuning of the selective outsourcing approach blended with a consortium approach, rather than a radical change in the outsourcing model."

ING already has an existing €200m software development outsourcing deal with LogicaCMG and a €400m document processing contract with Astron.