UK govt office admits ability to negotiate billions in cloud spending curbed by vendor lock-in

Exclusive The UK government has admitted its negotiating power over billions of pounds of cloud infrastructure spending has been inhibited by vendor lock-in.

A document from the Cabinet Office's Central Digital & Data Office, circulated within Whitehall, seen by The Register, says the "UK government's current approach to cloud adoption and management across its departments faces several challenges" which combined result "in risk concentration and vendor lock-in that inhibit UK government's negotiating power over the cloud vendors."

The paper also says that if the UK government – which has spent tens of billions on cloud services in the last decade – does not change its approach, "the existing dominance of AWS and Azure in the UK Government's cloud services is set to continue."

"This path forecasts a future where, within a decade, the public sector could face the end of its ability to negotiate favourable terms, leading to entrenched vendor lock-in and potential regulatory scrutiny from [UK regulator] the Competition and Markets Authority."

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