A higher-education network in British Columbia will now be able to lower IT costs, thanks to a new partnership agreement with Calgary-based solution provider Long View Systems.
Long View, a perennial member of CDN’s Top 100 Solution Provider list, has entered into a Master Service Agreement (MSA) with BCNET, a not-for-profit, shared information technology services consortium led by its members, British Columbia’s higher education and research institutions that include: Simon Fraser University, University of B.C. and the British Columbia Institute of Technology.
The MSA offers BCNET members a pre-negotiated price and service contract for software licensing and hardware support. The MSA allows BCNET’s higher-education member institutions to reduce software licensing costs, while simplifying the buying process. Long View was able to optimize vendor prices by acting as a broker on behalf of BCNET members to negotiate and procure contracts with technology vendors such as Microsoft, HP, NetApp, IBM, Red Hat, Symantec, VMware, Adobe, and others.
BCNET serves 12 higher-education member institutions in B.C., while its high-speed, high-capacity fiber optic advanced network interconnects 65 of the province’s higher-education and research institution sites, plus 72 colleges, schools, and universities, through the Provincial Learning Network (PLNet).
Sarah Malcolm-Morreau, Long View’s director of licensing and contracts, said her company was honoured to collaborate with BCNET to help drive down member costs and save the membership time and energy in managing licensing and support contracts.
Long View’s pre-negotiated contracts will ensure BCNET members receive the lowest price available, and maintain an efficient, streamlined buying process for higher-education institutions in B.C.
Michael Hrybyk, BCNET’s President and CEO said Long View’s vendor team will enable the higher-education member institutions to simplify the purchase and audit process, and maximize the value of every dollar invested in software licensing.
Michael Thorson, the University of British Columbia’s Director Infrastructure, Information Technology, said last year, UBC signed a contract with Long View for contract and license management, and Long View has been able to produce significant cost savings without reducing the volume of software purchased.
