5.12 Treasury group ICT assets can be considered in six categories, summarised as follows.
• Underlying communications and network facilities. Our policy is to replace on a rolling cycle as follows:
• Switches: 7 years
• Firewalls: 5 years
• Servers and computer room management systems. Our policy is to replace on a rolling 5-year cycle.
• Printers. Our policy is to replace on a rolling 5-year cycle.
• Desktop and laptop end-user computers. Our policy is to replace on a rolling 3-year cycle, reflecting advances in end-user technology, but as each item is less than £5k, they are written down in year. As technology and security advances, our use of laptop computers to support flexible working has been and will continue to increase as a proportion of the IT asset estate.
• Software systems and applications - such as EDRMS, COINS, ACME, Budget Database, Finance, Procurement and HR business support systems, information architecture and content management designs for Intranet and Internet web-based tools. Our policy is to write these down over a 5-year period.
• Other end-user devices, such as personal digital assistants, mobile phones and blackberries. These are treated in two parts, such that the devices themselves are written down in year, reflecting the frequent changes of models available, although users are expected to achieve at least a 3-year working life from them. Where back-end management systems are required, such as Blackberry Enterprise Servers, these will be managed on a 3-5 year life, reflecting the changes in technology in this area.
5.13 The strategy to implement a new, shared network for OGC and Treasury has now been designed, and implementation will take place in early 2008, taking advantage of opportunities to build economies of scale in network topology and the shared systems that operate on them.
5.14 As part of the GSS programme we will benchmark our service performance on this model and consider an ICT shared service arrangement with other government departments and this may involve an asset transfer. This decision will be made on the balance of business benefit to each part of the group, as there are significant risks to meeting the specialist strategic needs of each relatively small and specialised business within the Group