The Hindu Business Line : TCS bags $65-m deal from UK co

Tata Consultancy Services has won a $65-million (Rs 292.5 crore) seven-year deal from Somerfield, a UK-based small-format food retailer, to provide a range of IT services.

TCS will take over the entire IT operations, asset management and planning for Somerfield. It will provide a managed IT infrastructure and applications service within Somerfield, enabling it to meet its current and future business demands, said a statement from TCS.

"TCS would be the single point of contact for the customer since we would be responsible for and monitor the execution of contracts that the customer would have with third party vendors," said Mr Phiroz Vandrevala, Executive Vice-President and Global Head, Corporate Services.

The company would get a certain percentage of the $100-million worth of contracts that Somerfield has with hardware and other services vendors, he added, not specifying the percentage.

"In addition to this deal, we hope to also gain from the client's discretionary IT spending in future," he said. "Also, the current deal does not include business process outsourcing. That is an opportunity we hope to gain from, too."

Somerfield is a chain of small- to- medium-sized supermarkets operating in the UK. The TCS project, however, entails a reduction in employee numbers at Somerfield's Bristol office of around 115 persons.

Operating as Somerfield Stores Ltd, the company is the fifth largest food retailer in the UK as of 2006, with 1,132 stores.

TCS has around 3,000 people working in some 50 locations in the UK and another 900 at its site in Peterborough, but it still had 150-200 vacancies, said the statement.

Earlier, TCS had indicated that it would announce at least five deals greater than $ 50 million in size in the foreseeable future. "Qantas was the first deal. Somerfield is the second," added Mr Vandrevala, saying that one would hear more from the company.

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