HP secures lucrative Nasa deal

Hewlett-Packard has been awarded a prestigious Nasa contract to provide and manage PCs, software, peripherals and associated end-user and IT services for the space agency over 10 years.

The contract, worth up to $2.5 billion (£1.6bn), will also see the technology firm imparting support services to Nasa staff in computation, business, science and research.

The project was being run by long-time Nasa contractor Lockheed Martin.

Sheila Collins, a spokeswoman for Lockheed, said in an e-mail statement: "Our team is disappointed that Nasa selected another solution. We submitted a 'best-value' solution based on our knowledge of the programme and our understanding of Nasa's mission. We continue to serve Nasa on other contracts."

HP has worked with the space agency previously in 2007, when it secured a seven-year deal worth up to $5.6 billion (£3.6bn) under Nasa's Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement scheme, under which the company was providing PCs, printers, and other hardware to any federal agency through Nasa.

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