On-demand, enterprise class virtual machines and storage solutions enable Home Office to tailor storage and computing requirements resulting in significant cost savings

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) helps employers make safer recruitment decisions and prevent unsuitable people from working with vulnerable groups, including children. It replaces the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) and Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA). DBS is an executive non-departmental public body of the Home Office.

The Home Office’s contract with Skyscape has an estimated value per annum of £1.5m and was awarded via the G-Cloud Framework, the cross Government initiative to deliver flexible ICT systems to the UK public sector via the CloudStore. Having considered a major service integrator and other G-Cloud offerings, the Home Office awarded Skyscape the PaaS contract, with the service due to go live in early 2014.

Market leading assured cloud provider Skyscape Cloud Services has achieved Impact Level 3 Pan Government Accreditation for all of its G-Cloud services, confirming its suitability to support the sensitive nature of the information that the DBS handles.

“Our Platform as a Service offering will help the Home Office to dramatically reduce capital expenditure, and also facilitate savings in operational costs and time,” said Phil Dawson, CEO of Skyscape. “Furthermore, Skyscape’s Pan Government Accreditation for all of its G-Cloud services means that the DBS can take advantage of Skyscape’s high performance and scalable cloud solutions, without any compromise to its significant data security requirements.”

Skyscape provides a range of cloud computing services dedicated to the UK public sector, delivered with leading technologies from Alliance Partners: QinetiQ, VMware, Cisco, EMC and Ark Continuity. “We’re delighted to hear more good news from Skyscape Cloud Services, one of our key partners in delivering cloud services to the UK Public Sector”, commented Cliff Keast, Head of Public Sector UK for VMware. “This significant win further validates the adoption of cloud by government organisations as they strive to reduce costs and deliver better service to the public. VMware vCloud services allow these organisations to embrace the cloud with confidence by using a software-defined data centre that delivers enterprise-class security and infrastructure compatibility”.

Skyscape is currently working on over 100 projects across central government, local authorities, police, healthcare and other publicly funded bodies.