Mobile phone retailer Carphone Warehouse has brought in IBM to manage and service its computing infrastructure in a deal that will stretch over several years and involve the transfer to the service provider of 140 Carphone staff.
Financial details of the arrangement have not been disclosed, but the companies did confirm that the cost-saving deal would cover the delivery of infrastructure services across service desk, servers, storage, desktop, network and data centre environments.
I am confident that this will offer lasting benefits such as increased service levels and efficiency improvements, Carphone’s chief technology officer Simon Post said in a statement.
The company could expect a good amount of business change in the next few quarters.
Earlier this week it emerged that Carphone Warehouse was considering a last minute bid for Tiscali’s UK broadband business after withdrawing from talks last year.
The mobile phone business is also likely to split out its TalkTalk, fixed-line and broadband business, from its retail stores. The plan there is to convert the retail units into Best Buy Europe, a new joint venture with American electronics group.
It has also this month announced a deal with Monitise, a provider of mobile banking solutions, to provide mobile financial services to consumers through stores, websites, call centre agents and other marketing initiatives.
