Atos has been awarded a five year contract worth £74m by the Department of Health.

The company will deliver an integrated IT desktop service plus a range of supporting services within the DH and for some of its arms length bodies, including the Care Quality Commission.

In a statement, the DH said: “The procurement was conducted against the ASCC framework using an in-house team.

"[It] has delivered a flexible contract that will result in savings of around 40% on the current cost of service across the life of the contract.”

Wayne Gibson, senior vice-president, government and health at Atos, said: “Our new solution makes the Government’s ICT Strategy, sustainability and open source initiatives a reality.

"We will work with [small and medium sized enterprises] and use open source software to deliver a service that offers value for money."

As part of the contract, Atos will also deliver a new data centre, infrastructure, internal communications and training.