TCS wins $43 million Norwegian contract

Norway Post has awarded 250 million Norwegian Krone (about $43 million or Rs232 crore) contracts each to India's Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and European IT company Capgemini to manage its IT applications.

The Nordic mail and logistics group, which delivers more than 36 million packages and 2.2 billion letters per year, is planning to modernise its operations.

''The new contracts will make it possible to reduce costs considerably and gives us access to relevant expertise from two large, recognised global players. We've now paved the way for new and future-oriented IT solutions for Norway Post,'' Morten Stødle, chief information officer with Norway Post (Posten Norge AS), said.

The six-year, multi-million dollar deal is to make postal services more competitive, TCS said, adding the contract encompasses delivery of a wide range of application development and support services.

Apart from being selected to deliver application services across the core postal value chains, TCS has also been entrusted to coordinate and drive the overall transition and transformation programme across multiple vendors.

''The postal industry is one of the most impacted by the disruptive power of technology, wherein growth of emails, social media and mobile messaging has impacted traditional business models. Conversely, there are tremendous new growth opportunities for this industry by leveraging the transition towards the new digital consumer.

Postal companies need to re-imagine their business model and get access to new age partners and capabilities that can help them change seamlessly, while they perform their daily operations,'' said Amit Bajaj, head of North Europe at TCS.

Capgemini Norge AS, part of the Capgemini Group, has won the contract for the delivery of application management and development of core applications, it said in a separate statement.

The agreement has a value of 34 million euros and will last throughout 2019. The contract builds on an innovative 'as-a-service' commercial model where the costs will be adjusted based on the services that are provided.

Capgemini will leverage its Rightshore approach using its delivery centers in Oslo in Norway, Helsingborg in Sweden and Mumbai in India. The contract includes outsourcing of central applications, such as enterprise resource planning and data warehousing.

Capgemini, which has already been working with Norway Post for more than 10 years, will act as a its strategic partner to support Norway Post with modernisation in an industry that faces many challenges. This includes decreasing mail volume with the popularity of email and pressure on margins due to the tough global economy and competition from smaller competitors willing to operate on a low price point.

''This is a significant and innovative contract for Capgemini here in Norway and Capgemini as a group. We are both humble and proud that Norway Post, with whom we've build a long-standing relationship, has entrusted us with this important delivery project'', said Ola Furu, chief executive officer at Capgemini Norge AS.