Decision details

The Cabinet Member:

1.    Authorised the contract award to SoftCat Plc  for the provision of Peterborough City Council (PCC) Computer Desktop (including Microsoft Office 365) Licences at a cost of £1.9m for the period 31 December 2019 to 30 December 2022.

2.    Authorised the Director: Customer and Digital Services to vary this Contract if required, subject to approval by the Director of Law and Governance (or authorised officer’s) and the Corporate Director of Resources.

The reasons for recommendations are outlined in the benefits section in section 1 above, notably to relicense with council desktop estate for Microsoft for the period 2019-2022

Do nothing: This is not an option as the licence agreement expires 30/12/2019. The council cannot operate without valid licensing.

Consider other options: As mentioned about in section 4.3 of the report there is limited scope for cost reductions even via a reseller route and Microsoft do not contract directly. By requesting pricing from 4 resellers the council has identified the most advantageous option within the constraints set by Microsoft.

Alterative Licensing Model: The recommended Licensing model is the Digital Transformation Agreement (DTA). This provides for a fixed licence fee based on users at the start of the agreement but with an allowance for annual adjustment. Microsoft’s alternative model know as Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) provides for monthly fluctuation in licence numbers however license costs are higher. Calculations show this route to be more expensive over the three years.

None.

None.