This procurement aims to award a number of framework agreements for the provision of IT Infrastructure as a Service.

The procurement is being run on behalf the European Research and Education Sector and includes the National Research and Education entities in each country and the entities which receive network services from them (10 000 institutions with over 50 000 000 users). It will:

— Make it easier for the Research and Education Community to consume IaaS solutions in a manner compliant with European procurement legislation and with the right conditions of use. By aggregating demand across the community and negotiating integrated brokerage and service delivery, the Community will be able to get the best possible value from cloud services.

— Make it easier for Cloud Service Providers to reach and deliver their IaaS solutions to the Community, efficiently and at large. This procurement provides a direct route to the Research and Education Community.

A competitive dialogue procedure is being used as the exact number of frameworks and lots is uncertain at the point of issue of the PQQ.