---
title: "DDSFTW/060 - Microsoft Unified Support & Design Services"
ocid: "ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7"
canonical_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7"
markdown_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7.md"
json_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7.json"
source: "Find A Tender Service"
current_stage: "Award"
buyer: "MINISTRY OF DEFENCE, DEFENCE DIGITAL COMMERCIAL SOURCING TEAM"
published: "2022-05-20"
---

# DDSFTW/060 - Microsoft Unified Support & Design Services

Buyer: MINISTRY OF DEFENCE, DEFENCE DIGITAL COMMERCIAL SOURCING TEAM  
Current stage: Award  
OCID: ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7

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## Summary

The Ministry of Defence's Defence Digital Commercial Sourcing Team has initiated a procurement process for the project titled "DDSFTW/060 - Microsoft Unified Support & Design Services". This tender, classified under the industry category of software support services, is set to take place in the United Kingdom. The procurement stage is currently at the Award phase, with the contract estimated at £31 million and running for 36 months, from 1 June 2022 to 30 April 2025. The procurement method is limited, conducted via a negotiated procedure without prior publication of a contract notice, indicating a specific technical need that only the proposed contractor, Microsoft UK PLC, can fulfil.

This contract presents significant opportunities for businesses that specialise in software support and consultancy services, particularly those with expertise in Microsoft products and applications. As the services are integral to the UK Ministry of Defence's operations and related to national security, businesses with a background in IT consultancy, support services, or defence technologies would be well-suited to explore similar contracts in the future. The necessity for immediate technical support and the high value of the contract underlines the demand for proficient suppliers in this sector.

## Notice

Single source for the provision of Unified Support, Maintenance and Consultancy Service for 36 months from 1 June 22 through to 30 April 2025.

### Lot Information

Lot 1

The Defence Digital Commercial Sourcing Team, part of the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence (the Authority), intends to award a contract to Microsoft Ltd (the Contractor) for software (including Microsoft Office 365 E5) consultancy, support and maintenance (including updates) services. The duration of the contract will be for 36 months from 1 June 2022 to 30 April 2025 and has an estimated value of PS31,000,000 (ex VAT). It is considered that this contract can be placed using the negotiated procedure without prior publication of a contract notice pursuant to Article 32(2)(b)(ii) of Directive 2014/24/EU and Regulation 32(2)(b)(ii) of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (SI 102) on the basis that the services provided for in the contract can be supplied only by the Contractor, and that competition is absent, for technical reasons. The Contractor alone has the specific technical knowledge and skills necessary to undertake the services as they own and have developed the relevant software products and applications used by the Authority in connection with its operations Please note this contract is yet to be awarded, this VTN remains open until 12.00 on the 30 May 2022.

### Procurement Information

The MOD utilises a large volume of the Microsoft product set to support its business and military operations and relies upon the Microsoft Support services for support and assistance at all security tiers. Not being able to access these Microsoft specific services would represent a risk to national security in the event of an issue with the software. This includes the necessity to deploy Microsoft specialists on short notice to wherever is required, including overseas Bases and Theatre. MOD is also a significant Customer in the UK who continue to run UK hosted Azure services in the cloud. The MOD requirement mandates data sovereignty and reliability and this non-negotiable requirement can only be supported by Microsoft for these services at this scale. Previously where MOD moved to O365 Cloud service, required regular and extensive access to the Microsoft product developers in the US in liaison with security cleared Microsoft Consultants in the UK was essential considering the critical and complexity which MOD represents as a customer. The current requirements cannot be delivered without the direct access to Microsoft Support with the scale of the MOD's product exploitation and the level of expertise required will not be available if we contract with a 3rd party consultancy. Furthermore, we have the evidence that by having direct links to product developers, we have been able to solve issues with the service that are unique to MOD's future requirements & maintain national security. Direct connection to Microsoft product engineers is required to allow this to continue. This contract also ensures the MOD is part of the Microsoft preview pilots for all Microsoft cloud offerings and only a handful of organisations around the world get early access to products before they are released. Having this early exposure gives the MOD the opportunity to influence and shape the products to suit our future defence needs: we will not get this access without a direct relationship with Microsoft. Without Microsoft direct support the level of technical risk to MOD's transition from existing monolithic contract arrangements would be too high to be appropriate for Defence. MOD is already using Microsoft expertise to mitigate these risks, in particular when leveraging expertise in the US product groups to assist us with this activity, again coupled with our on-site SMEs who provide the context of the often non-standard deployment of Microsoft technologies across Defence. Latterly having one less commercial interface between the Microsoft Premier support and design consultancy has proven to deliver seamless interoperability, reduce risk and ensures that critical high-quality design work is delivered at pace and right first time. Microsoft is the largest software provider to Defence; this support and design service is integral to supporting our business and military operations worldwide at all security tiers. In the case of a deployed we have previously used this contract to deploy Microsoft specialists to Operational theatres at short notice, Op HERRICK in Afghanistan, being an example.

## Key Details

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication source | Find A Tender Service |
| Latest notice | https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/013650-2022 |
| Notice type | Award Notice |
| Procurement type | Standard |
| Procurement category | Services |
| Procurement method | Limited |
| Procurement method details | Negotiated without publication of a contract notice |
| Tender suitability | Not specified |
| Awardee scale | Large |
| All stages | Award |

## Dates

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Publication date | 20 May 2022 |
| Submission deadline | Not specified |
| Future notice date | Not specified |
| Award date | 19 May 2022 |
| Contract period | Not specified |
| Recurrence | Not specified |

## Values

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender value | Not specified |
| Lots value | Not specified |
| Awards value | Not specified |
| Contracts value | £31,000,000 |

## Status

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Tender status | Complete |
| Lots status | Not specified |
| Awards status | Active |
| Contracts status | Active |

## Buyer

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Main buyer | MINISTRY OF DEFENCE, DEFENCE DIGITAL COMMERCIAL SOURCING TEAM |
| Locality | CORSHAM |
| Post town | Swindon |
| Postcode | SN13 9NR |
| Country | England |
| ITL 1 | TLK South West (England) |
| ITL 2 | TLK7 Gloucestershire and Wiltshire |
| ITL 3 | TLK72 Wiltshire |
| Local authority | Wiltshire |
| Electoral ward | Corsham Ladbrook |
| Westminster constituency | Chippenham |
| Delivery location | TLJ South East (England) |

## Supplier

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Number of suppliers | 1 |
| Supplier names | MICROSOFT |

## CPV Codes

### Divisions

- 72 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support

### Codes

- 72261000 - Software support services

## Release History

- 20 May 2022 at 14:58 - Award - Award Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/013650-2022

## Notice URLs

- https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-defence
- https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/government-security-classifications
- https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/about/contact/

## Provenance

This Markdown file is an alternate public rendering of the D3 Tenders contract record. The canonical page is https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7. The underlying structured data is available as OCDS JSON at https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-033bf7.json.