The contract was awarded at the beginning of this month, with Iron Mountain, Capita, TNT, Derwent Living and Remploy LPS being named as preferred suppliers.

Although the framework covers the physical management and transportation of documentation produced by government departments, it also requires storage of electronic media, electronic management, electronic tracking and scanning of materials.

Those set to benefit from the agreement include central government departments, arms-length bodies and agencies, the NHS, educational establishments, the emergency services, housing and local authorities and the third sector.

In , it was revealed yesterday by the new director of the G-Cloud, Denise McDonagh, that Amazon and Salesforce are expected to be named as suppliers in the next iteration of the framework.

The two cloud companies were noticeable in their absence from the initial list of more than 250 suppliers initially accepted, half of which were SMEs.