UK Government Program Procures Atlassian SaaS Tools
The UK Shared Business Services has awarded a £29,000 contract for Atlassian software products for its Matrix Programme. The procurement highlights the ongoing shift within UK government agencies toward adopting modular, off-the-shelf SaaS tools. This approach favors rapid deployment over traditional, large-scale IT projects.
- The Matrix Programme is part of the broader Government Shared Services (GSS) Strategy and aims to consolidate nine government departments onto a single SaaS system for HR, finance, and payroll services. - Departments involved in the Matrix Programme include the Cabinet Office, Department for Education, Department of Health and Social Care, and HM Treasury, among others. - This procurement aligns with the UK's long-standing "Cloud First" policy, originally established in 2013, which mandates that public sector organizations prioritize cloud solutions for new and existing IT services. - The government is moving towards a more strategic approach to digital sourcing, with a new digital sourcing strategy and the Procurement Act 2023 aiming to simplify processes and improve access for SMEs. - UK Shared Business Services (UKSBS) acts as the shared service center for the Matrix Programme, and it leverages external SaaS suppliers and managed service providers to deliver these services. - The UK public sector spends over £1 billion annually on cloud solutions, a figure that is expected to grow. The Government Digital Service (GDS) is developing a tool to track this spending in near real-time to ensure value for taxpayer money. - Atlassian tools like Jira are often used within government to support agile project management, IT Service Management (ITSM), and to overhaul legacy technology systems. - This small contract is part of a much larger government IT expenditure; for context, the G-Cloud 14 framework for cloud computing and related services is valued at a maximum of £6.5 billion.
