HP Services Scores $2.5 Billion NASA Deal, SAP Cloud Certification

Under the NASA contract, a four-year deal with two three-year options, HP Enterprise Services will overhaul the end user computing infrastructure for the agency's 60,000 employees, providing desktops, computing devices and associated services as part of NASA’s Agency Consolidated End-User Service (ACES) program.

HP doesn't spell it out, but this will likely include not only desktops and notebooks but also HP's WebOS tablets and smartphones. "Computing seat and cellular seat services are designed with security and collaboration capabilities to help the NASA team safely share information," HP said Thursday in a statement.

HP Enterprise Services will also provide NASA with Computing Seat, Tier 2/3 Service Desk Support and Collaboration Services, and the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company will also partner with small businesses to deliver on the terms of the ACES contract.

"The ACES contract will help evolve NASA’s IT environment to a centralized, adaptable IT infrastructure to enable economies of scale, agency-wide visibility and improved management and security," said Dennis Stolkey, senior vice president and general manager of HP Enterprise Services' U.S. Public Sector division, in a statement.

Meanwhile, HP Enterprise Services on Wednesday achieved SAP certification that covers the delivery of SAP applications through HP’s cloud computing services. HP says it obtained this after going through an intensive auditing process that includes technical, physical, management and logical security processes supporting SAP applications

"With this certification, HP can deliver SAP solutions via the cloud with increased flexibility and rapid provisioning, resulting in lower costs and less risk for companies to consume the full benefits of enterprise applications," said Kathy Garcia, senior vice president of applications for HP Enterprise Services, in a statement.

On Monday, HP launched Strategic IT Advisory Services, a set of offerings aimed at enterprise CIOs that includes guidance and planning for cloud computing, enterprise architecture and service management.

In addition to helping CIOs wield IT as a competitive advantage, HP says its services can reduce IT costs, boost ROI and respond more quickly to changing business needs.