TNT hybrid cloud deal boosts HP's struggling enterprise services division
TNT - one of the world's largest delivery firms - has partnered with HP as it seeks to modernise its infrastructure, reducing cost by consolidating its existing data centre footprint from 11 facilities worldwide down to just two.
The latest contract involves creating a hybrid cloud environment using a combination of traditional hosting services and HP Helion Managed Private Cloud, providing infrastructure as a service resources based on the OpenStack open source cloud management platform.
Details of the deal haven't been disclosed, but it is believed to be worth in the region of hundreds of millions of pounds.
It is the second large services contract that HP has announced in recent weeks. Prior to announcing its disappointing financial results - with Enterprise Services revenues falling seven percent - the supplier announced a 10-year deal with German banking giant Deutsche Bank - said to be worth billions of pounds. Meanwhile other deals with firms such as Halfords and Ted Baker have provided some positivity in the UK, and shown that HP can still rival IBM for the biggest deals, with its competitor unveiling some significant services contracts in recent months, such as a multibillion dollar contract with ABN Amro and WPP.
TechMarketView analyst Kate Hanaghan said that the TNT is proof that HP is making headway in attempts to position itself in the changing services market as more businesses become comfortable with deploying the cloud.
"We believe that the TNT and Deutsche Bank deals demonstrate that HP is convincing buyers of its ability to provide cloud-delivered services in parallel with a traditional environment, alongside managing the transition from the latter into the cloud," she said.
"Indeed, we believe the ability of suppliers to simultaneously support/deliver these 'parallel universes' (i.e. legacy and 'new world' technologies) is becoming absolutely essential."
For TNT the project is part of a wider IT overhaul and transformation strategy, named 'Outlook'. Earlier this month the Netherlands-based firm announced a five-year application management deal with Indian outsourcer Infosys, and a managed cloud-based unified communications deal with Verizon Enterprise Solutions.