Welcome to the telco, we've got fun and games: BT inks 5-year deal to outsource mainframe management to IBM

BT is outsourcing management of its mainframe estate to IBM in a five-year agreement that kicks off today. And while it may be April Fools' Day, some incumbent staff being TUPEd across to Big Blue aren't laughing. Staff at the British telco were told about the move in January, then formal consultations with the CWU and …

[Anonymous Coward]

Project Sovereign

Ah, I remember the internal backronym: Sod Off Vallance, Every Reorg Ever Invented Got Nowhere.

[theExecutive]

IBM

1. So they have plenty to spaff on IBM (Not British) see here .. https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/04/01/bbc_broadband_levy/

2. They expect us to fund them, and they choose IBM, nobody ever got retained for buying IBM :)

3. IBM is BBC?

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/04/01/bbc_broadband_levy/

https://www.cbronline.com/cloud/ibm-wins-5-year-bbc-contract-to-drive-mobile-and-cloud-transformation-4859910/

https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450280976/BBC-outsources-finance-and-accounting-technology-to-IBM

4. Its 1st April

[Steve K]

Re: IBM

I think you are confused - this article was about BT. They have not been taxpayer-funded since the 1980's

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: IBM

“ They have not been taxpayer-funded since the 1980's”

Kool-Aid goggles?

[Steve Davies 3]

One thing is certain

and that is that the number of jobs and kit in Blighty will get an awful lot smaller and possibly down to around ZERO.

IBM really does mean "I've Been Mugged" for each and everyone affected by this move.

[druck]

Re: One thing is certain

Yes, and "hear more about IBM and its culture", I think everyone knows they their feet won't even touch the carpet before being offshored.

[big_D]

Re: One thing is certain

Yes, or to put the subtitles on the story, "we are moving to the cloud and have B-Arked the mainframe team."

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: One thing is certain

One site where I worked they just renamed the current data centres as the <insert company name here> cloud... job done, now we're in the cloud and IBM got the client to swallow that!

Step 2 seemed to be to parachute in a load of IBMers to bill their time, things gradually stopped getting done for the client and it looked to me that the plan was to drink the client dry and then jump ship.

6 years down the road and the client is thoroughly pissed off and looking to get out of the contract....

[Doctor Syntax]

"The five-year contract with IBM nestles well with BT's intention to close the public switched telephone network by 2025."

I wonder. Applying the basic law of project timelines "close the PSTN by 2025" translates to "close the PSTN starting in 2025 at the earliest". When that happens we can reasonably expect customer support calls to go up just as the contract for supporting this system supporting customer service ends. From IBM's PoV the renewal nestles well with that, maybe from the BT side not so much.

[Anonymous Coward]

No problem

Renew Big Blue and outsource customer support to India.

[Repne Scasb]

Help me out here

I'm confused.

"what we do brilliantly and what our partners can do brilliantly"

Hmm, I know IBM are pretty good at redundancies, especially of older staff, although it sounds like many will jump first, but remind me, what is it BT do brilliantly again?

[Warm Braw]

Re: Help me out here

what is it BT do brilliantly again?

Sell off assets and rent them back. Unfortunately, like equity-release mortgages, it only works if you intend to die shortly.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Help me out here

You forgot open their database to hackers. Hopefully IBM can do a better job.

[DJV]

What IBM do brilliantly...

...has already been covered by the Register here.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Help me out here

what is it BT do brilliantly again?

Defend and milk monopolies.

[big_D]

Re: Help me out here

Yes, they have B-Arked the mainframe staff. Just be thankful that the telephone sanitisers didn't go with them. ;-)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Help me out here

> what is it BT do brilliantly again

Surely BT stands for Brilliant Telephony?

[Anonymous Coward]

On the subject of BT and India

The lockdown in India seems to have dramatically reduced the number of calls supposedly coming from 'Windows Support'. As I don't have any MS products at home, I'm spared giving them a dose of verbals in Hindi that challenge the caste of their mother.

[Sean o' bhaile na gleann]

Re: On the subject of BT and India

"...challenge the caste of their mother."

Ohhh! Please, please, please: how do you say that? How do you pronounce it? Go on... pleeeease!

(my minimal language skills only got me as far as COBOL and FORTRAN)

[GreyWolf]

Re: On the subject of BT and India

I learned a little Hindi specifically for the purpose of telling "Jack from Mumbai" to go forth and multiply himself. I found the novel Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra to be useful (lots of police slang). Here's what I have:

Chubbarao = Shut Up (say it with force)

I am a burra Sahib = I am a great lord

You are a chota-wallah = You are a small person of no value (if the caller is female, chota-wallee)

And the killer "Are your mother and father proud of how you earn your money?". I got one of them to scream and hang up.

Current favourite: I say "You have reached the BT Business Support Helpdesk. All calls to this number cost £25. Please have your credit card ready. Read out the long number across the front". They hang up before I have finished saying that. And if they don't, I repeat it.

[Anonymous Coward]

The former state telco said the deal will "allow the transferring team to focus on best-in-class mainframe delivery, supported by a wider team." It added the outsourcing will also give the BT team moving to IBM broader career pathways"

Well, good luck finding "the wider team", and as for "IBM broader career pathways" that usually means a career outside of IBM.

My commiserations.

[earl grey]

they are well and truly forked

having worked at a place years ago that forked the employees over to I've Been Mislead, stealing employees pensions, and then having IBM dump a whole lot of those folks prior to the contract ending.... and then watching the same thing happen years later (again - some folks are slow learners) and watching as big blue proceeded to dump more and more of the experienced (yes, older) workers and try to force many more into relocation (at your own expense)...

Ah, fuck 'em.

[Anonymous Coward]

IBM the premier waste management company

Because waste is how management view older higher paid employees.

[Anonymous Coward]

IBM pulled out of our outsourcing solicitation

IBM pulled out of our outsourcing solicitation

I was actually concerned how bad our business must be in if IBM decided not to bid.

[AnAnonymousCanuck]

Re: IBM pulled out of our outsourcing solicitation

Or they realized that your company was competent

[joeW]

I spent a good deal of time trying to sing the second half of the headline to the tune of the first.

[Tom 7]

Two dinosaurs summoning an asteroid?

Could be fun to watch.

[Anonymous Coward]

So, they have a team that is high functioning (despite underpaying) and now they have transferred that team to a 3rd party, who have to honour the team's Ts and Cs / liabilities etc (so no cheaper)

Then they are going to pay that supplier the cost of the team + supplier's margin.

And sell the supplier some old kit (all all know how good a dealer trading is!), then the new supplier is going to replace the kit with new kit they supply and BT is going to effectively rent the service back?

I don't have an MBA, so I don't see how paying more for something (that was previously heavily sweated and working well) is good value for BT's shareholders...

M

[Anonymous Coward]

I expect the people working on these databases are of a certain age and an expensive recruitment and training exercise would be on the cards if it stayed in-house. Presumably IBM won't have to pay themselves the licensing costs for the metal and tools and OS either.

I can see how you could make a case to do this based on avoiding a big bill quite soon, even if it means quite high bills in the medium term.

[TheBorg]

Glad to see that CSS is still running on those mainframes - In 1995 when I was at Bletchley they told us it would all transfer to open systems ...... we laughed at them then, seems we understood more than the manglement :)

[GreyWolf]

CSS is still running

And if BT ever shut it down, the entire UK landline network will become impossible to make any changes to.

Maybe that's why BT are killing the UK landline network.

[Anonymous Coward]

I misread the signs...

I misread the signs in the header image as "Outhouse Insource", and it kinda fit.

Will be interesting to see how this one turns out.

[amanfromMars 1]

Well, IT certainly is different with such Convivial Communions

IBM/BT ..... Goliaths Entertaining Davids in Plain Text View of All Other Surreal and Stealthy Operating Systems.

Are IBM real good or virtually crap at simply following BT instructions for CSS/COSMOSS Feeds ?

IT never takes long to find out.

How real good or virtually crap are BT at providing IBM Special Server Instruction Services ?

IT never takes long to find out the lay of the lands in that most particular and refreshingly peculiar field of exploration and experimentation.

And refreshingly peculiar because one never surely knows what the future brings, although if you can dream it so good that you can love it and are able to share those great creatively imaginative thoughts with everybody, are future pictures easily enough universally exchanged and grand master plans changed to accommodate such a Totally Unusual Event and Absolutely Fabulous Opportunity.

Does Blighty Do Almighty ? And that question to Boris and Dominic of the Downing Street Lair Gang, Gung Ho Tories gone all Crazy Nation Rogue Native? Or have they only just half come out?

That's an answer surely of instant great interest to the Register and El Regers, for yes leads us further on into how and no identifies a false prophets and failed enterprises ...... and a Rank Eton Mess of an Horrendous Prank to Boot Out or Reboot Rooted at the Cabinet Responsibility Heart of UKGBNI Government ?

It's a bit of a no-brainer the right answer always for immensely fast further action satisfying those sorts of instrumental questions.

[The Nazz]

Re: Well, IT certainly is different with such Convivial Communions

Out of curiosity, are you like this down the pub?

[ValleyBoy]

Good god, CSS is still going????

I thought they switched over to some awful Oracle product for Customer Service. If I think hard enough, I may even remember some of the transaction codes...

Many years ago, BT did this with other IT staff. Server Support, and I think even the DBAs, got TUPE'd over to HP. A few years later, they were all TUPE'd back to BT.