(RTTNews) - UK's leading support services company Carillion Plc (CLLN.L: News ) said Tuesday that a Carillion-telent joint venture has signed a 7-year contract worth GBP 1 billion with Openreach, British Telecommunications Plc's local access network business, to provide support services.

John McDonough, Carillion's chief executive said, "The award of this nationwide contract that will transform service delivery for Openreach further reinforces Carillion's position as a leading supplier of support services for infrastructure and buildings. This builds on the strong relationship Carillion already has with BT, for whom we have provided an integrated facilities management service for its UK estate since 2001."

The integrated joint venture will be a 60:40 Carillion-telent partnership. Under the contract, the joint venture will deliver various engineering, support and maintenance services. Carillion noted that services will include delivery of support and installation services, asset management and maintenance, across Openreach's five regions, comprising London and Home Counties, the South East, Midlands, Wales and West, the North, and Scotland.

The work is now carried out by a number of outsourced suppliers and the team is in the process of transferring work from the seven existing outsourced contracts over to the consolidated single supplier Carillion-telent.

John Small, managing director for service delivery, Openreach, said, "Openreach is introducing a new way of working with a single nationwide supplier that will drive up quality and lower our cost base, allowing us to continue to build a strong and healthy business."

In August, the Carillion-telent joint venture had signed a letter of intent with Openreach for a future contract to provide nationwide support services for Openreach.

Openreach is responsible for the nationwide local British Telecommunications network, which connects homes and businesses across Britain to communications providers' networks. Openreach provides communications providers with services and products associated with the network. telent is a supplier of network and communications services in the UK and Germany.

British Telecommunications Plc is a leading provider of communications solutions and services and a subsidiary of BT Group Plc.(BT: News , BT-A.L).
CLLN.L is currently trading at 289.7 pence, up 2.7 pence or 0.94%, on a volume of 78 thousand shares.

BT-A.L trades at 134.85 pence, down 0.4 pence or 0.3%, on 855 thousand shares on the LSE, while BT closed Monday's regular trading at $21.29 on the NYSE.

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by RTT Staff Writer

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