easyJet has outsourced its IT helpdesk support to the IT services division of facility management and utility support group Alfred McAlpine for the next three years. The primary driver of the deal is to migrate IT support from business hours to a 24-hour, seven days per week, (24/7) operation. The budget airline refused to divulge the value of the deal but speaking to silicon.com, IT service delivery manager Bill Codd said the deal would cost 50 per cent of the level of investment needed to bring helpdesk support up to 24/7 in-house.

Norwich Union's HR department has rolled out a search application to make it easier for staff to find out about employment policies themselves. The application allows staff to get information about straightforward policies, such as holiday allowance, pay conditions and absence. At time of publishing, more than 17,600 of the insurance giant's 35,000 employees have accessed the AskHR system, supplied by Transversal, over 51,000 times.

The project to deliver the technology behind the London 2012 Olympics will try to develop new talent from the region as part of the regeneration theme of the Games. The Olympic Games IT is delivered by the official technology supplier Atos Origin with a team of around 3,500 people - 80 per cent of whom are volunteers.

The UK's Insolvency Service has signed a £20m outsourcing deal with IBM to modernise its IT infrastructure and reduce costs. The Insolvency Service is the government department responsible for investigating companies and bankruptcies.

Technology services and integration company Morse has been selected as the preferred bidder for a £23m contract to overhaul the tech infrastructure of schools in the South Tyneside and Gateshead (STaG) area. The contract is to design and supply the IT infrastructure for 12 schools in the STaG area, including supplying computer hardware, software and online learning environments, and designing and supporting data centres, helpdesk, support and training for the schools' IT staff.

Virtualisation could save companies millions of pounds and be the dominant data centre technology within the next two to three years, according to analysts. Virtualisation can reduce the energy consumption and cut operating costs for companies adopting the technology, according to Butler Group's Infrastructure Virtualisation report. The report estimates a company currently operating 250 dual-core servers can save £2m over the next three years by adopting virtualisation technology.

Offshoring is creating a divide in the UK tech industry by reducing the proportion of mid-level software development jobs available in favour of higher level management roles, research has claimed. A report by IT staffing company ReThink Recruitment found that the proportion of jobs created in software development in the UK has fallen by six per cent in the past year from 34.3 per cent of new IT jobs to 28.5 per cent. During the same period, the proportion of IT support jobs - which are often seen as at risk from offshoring - has fallen from 24 per cent to 21.9 per cent.

Competition for outsourcing contracts is more cut-throat than ever with a huge expansion in the number of suppliers - so some significant consolidation is on the horizon. Recent rumours of a merger between sector heavyweights Infosys and Capgemini suggest the stars are aligning for some significant marriages. Duncan Aitchison, managing director of business advisory company TPI, told silicon.com even if the rumoured Infosys-Capgemini tie-up never materialises it reflects current "market sentiment", while other industry experts are predicting more mergers-and-acquisition activity in this sector over the next year or two.

Ever wondered what CIOs are reading on silicon.com? Our CIO Essentials feature puts you in the picture. Each week a leading IT chief picks his or her top stories from the past week and explains why they matter. This week we hear from Steve Clarke, head of internal computing at AOL UK. IM security unheard of among businesses AOL have used IM for years. It's embedded deeply in the culture and it really works. Before arriving at AOL, I'd never used IM in a business context and only briefly on a personal level but now it's an essential tool and I'm an advocate for its use. I wish I'd had access to IM in other roles - it would have helped me be more effective.

Marking a second round of layoffs this month, IBM has announced it will cut 1,566 jobs from its global workforce, primarily in its US strategic outsourcing services business. Big Blue, which employs 355,000 workers worldwide, said it expects to cut a total of 3,016 jobs by the end of the second quarter. That number includes 1,300 positions eliminated earlier this month.