Australian IT company ASG Group has joined forces with the Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) to be appointed preferred tenderer to supply hardware and services to the Western Australian government under its shared services plan.

Earlier this year the WA government announced that more than 100 government agencies will consolidate their back-office functions into three, shared service centers as part of a A$66.8 million (US$50 million) dollar deal with Oracle.

The 10-year Oracle deal involves consolidating 21 financial management and 12 payroll systems across 49 of the government"s largest agencies.

Since the announcement, the government has established the Office of Shared Services (OSS) which is appointing suppliers to work with Oracle.

Computerworld understands the ASG Group, which is based in Perth, will manage and host a range of applications to be located in CSC data centers.

ASG CEO Geoff Lewis was unable to provide details of the contract as negotiations are yet to be finalized.

"As preferred tenderer the consortium will now enter into detailed contract negotiations and due diligence activities; once completed we will release additional information," he said.

Through the introduction of a shared services model, the WA government expects to save taxpayers $50 million a year from the 2007-08 financial year.

Most of the IT systems currently in place are incompatible, but with the establishment of service centers agencies will pool resources for HR, finance and purchasing across the government.