A consortium led by Accenture Ltd has seen off a rival bid from a team led by IBM Global Services, to enter into exclusive negotiations over a major IT and network outsourcing deal with Dutch bank ING Groep NV.
A spokesperson for the bank confirmed to Computer Business Review that it is in discussions with Accenture and its partners Atos Origin SA, Getronics NV, and BT Group, although they could not give a timeframe for when a final contract could be signed.
A rival bid from a consortium including IBM Global Services, Unisys Corp, Centric, and KPN was rejected by ING. IBM currently manages ING’s IT infrastructure in the US under a seven-year $600m contract announced in December 2003.
ING announced in November that it was axing 500 jobs in its IT and Operations activities in the Benelux region, and was planning to outsource a further 2,200 jobs, as part of a plan to reduce costs by 190m euros ($227m) every year from 2008. About 700 jobs are expected to be outsourced as part of the IT and network outsourcing deal.
ING’s move follows a similar one from domestic banking rival ABN AMRO, which last September revealed plans to cut 1,500 internal technology jobs, transfer a further 2,000 to external vendors, and signed a total of $2.2bn in IT outsourcing contracts. It aims to make annual cost savings of 258m euros ($309m) from 2007 as a result.