Procurement for the provision of Hyperscaler Services to enable Data Centre Exit

Descriptions

INTRODUCTION & BACKGROUND HMRC's IT infrastructure has been building increasing levels of technical debt due to the age of the underlying hardware and software, making modernisation a priority for the organisation. As part of our ongoing technology strategy, we have developed cloud capabilities and platforms to manage parts of our previously migrated estate. This has provided us with valuable insights, reaffirming that cloud capabilities, and their continued evolution, present a strong opportunity to advance our journey towards modernisation. The Data Centre Exit (DCE) programme has identified that modern hyperscaler cloud technologies would be the preferred solution to transition to, whilst supporting HMRC's strategic objectives, without affecting business continuity or incurring an unaffordable cost of change. Furthermore, the strategy aligns with the capabilities of the market, the overall aspiration to move to the cloud, and evidence to suggest that transitioning to a cloud solution would be more scalable and cost-effective. The objective of the programme is to exit all services from three managed data centres and decommission any remaining infrastructure within the current contract period of the incumbent data centre hosting provider (June 2028). The scope of the technical migration is currently all services supported by hardware in the three data centres. Other programmes may have plans to migrate services prior to the DCE exit date and once those programmes are confirmed, HMRC will de-scope from DCE as appropriate. The procurement of a hyperscaler and subsequent award will provide a vehicle to deliver the technical migration to the public cloud of services within the scope of the programme, and their hosting for the remaining life of the contract. The specifics of the migration plan will be confirmed during the negotiation phase of the procurement process. The procurement of a hyperscaler will depend on meeting requirements that support an efficient, effective, and timely migration of the services within the scope, balancing cost, risk, timescale and without affecting service continuity. A comprehensive description of the outline services can be found within Annex 2 of the 'HMRC Tender Instructions.docx' document.