Microsoft bags massive US defence deal

Vendor's wares will be used on 1.5m Pentagon computers following signing of $617m deal at the weekend

Microsoft has inked a giant contract worth $617m (£380m) to supply the US Department of Defence (DoD) through one of its biggest partners, Insight Enterprises.

Announced over the weekend, the three-year deal will see Microsoft's wares rolled out on 1.5m of the Pentagon's computers, covering about 75 per cent of the DoD's 450,000-strong workforce.

The Joint Enterprise Licensing Agreement will serve the US Army, Air Force and Defence Information Systems Agency and will be serviced through Insight's public sector business.

Microsoft claims the agreement will modernise the DoD's technology, reduce its costs and allow new levels of cross-agency collaboration, as well as support the department's aims in datacentre consolidation, security, mobility, cloud and big data.

The agreement will see all three departments gain access to the newest Microsoft versions of Office and SharePoint, as well as Windows 8.

Research firm NPD claims the vendor's new OS has failed to reverse the slump in consumer laptop sales over the Christmas period. Its research shows that Windows notebook sales slumped 11 per cent over the holiday period in the US, while Macbook sales fell by only six per cent.

Microsoft said it was "honoured" that the DoD picked its software.

Tom Solms, general manager of the Microsoft DoD business, said: "This agreement enables us to provide the best technology tools to an incredibly broad range of servicemen and servicewomen across the DoD, and we are looking forward to implementing to support their mission goals."

Insight's EMEA boss Stuart Fenton reacted to the news on Twitter, claiming it was "the right technology decision".