Who is winning
Which competitors are winning UK public sector IT contracts
The eight suppliers winning the most UK public sector IT contracts from 2023 to 2025, ranked by award count, and how to read a ranking before trusting it.
Skim · Built on Skim's live UK procurement database29 September 20267 min read
Skim award records for UK buyers, CPV division 72 (IT services), awards dated 2023 to 2025 — three complete years, so a partly recorded 2026 cannot pass for a decline. Snapshot 29 September 2026. Rankings count awards whose supplier carries a national company identifier, so every count is a floor. Where one company appears under more than one record, the records visible in the ranking are merged and the merge is stated. Award counts only: no market value is quoted, because published values include framework ceilings shared across every supplier appointed to them.
The short answer
86%
Skim award records, snapshot 29 September 2026
To see which competitors are winning UK public sector contracts in your sector, count the awarded contracts in your CPV division by supplier. In IT services from 2023 to 2025, the four largest supplier records are Dell with 45 awards, Permanent Futures with 43, IBM with 39 across two merged records, and LA International with 32. Then open each leader's record and look at who it wins from, because a count on its own mostly measures how buyers package their work.
Two things decide whether a ranking like this is true, and most skip both. The order at the top here is not settled: IBM and LA International each have further records the ranking cannot see, and either could overtake Dell. And the second-largest record belongs to a supplier that won 86% of its public work from a single buyer. Both change what the number means.
How to build this ranking yourself, free
The ranking can be rebuilt from public notices at no cost, in an afternoon for one sector. The buyer-concentration table below needs one more export per supplier, set out in step four.
| Step | Where | What it gives you |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Search awarded notices | Contracts Finder for below-threshold awards, Find a Tender for above | Every published award in your sector, filtered by CPV code or keyword |
| 2. Export and count | The CSV download on either service | Awards per supplier — the raw ranking |
| 3. Merge the spellings | By hand, against Companies House numbers | One row per company rather than one per spelling |
| 4. Check the buyer spread | A second export: every award to that supplier, in any category and any year, grouped by buyer | Whether a leader wins broadly or from one relationship |
Steps three and four are the ones people skip, and they are the ones that decide whether the ranking is true. The next two sections show why.
The ranking
The eight suppliers with the most UK public sector IT awards from 2023 to 2025, counting awards whose supplier carries a company identifier, in the order the records give. Eight rather than ten, because below 19 awards the order can no longer be separated from suppliers the ranking does not show. Treat the top four as a group rather than an order: they sit within 13 awards of each other, and two of them have records outside this ranking.
| Rank as recorded | Supplier | Awards, 2023 to 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dell Corporation | 45 |
| 2 | Permanent Futures | 43 |
| 3 | IBM United Kingdom (two records merged) | 39 |
| 4 | LA International Computer Consultants | 32 |
| 5 | Bloom Procurement Services | 23 |
| 6 | Coforge UK | 21 |
| 7 | CGI IT UK | 20 |
| 8 | Actica Consulting | 19 |
IBM is the clearest case for step three. Unmerged, it appears twice in the underlying ranking, with 21 and 18 awards, and sits fifth. Merged, it is third — and it has at least two more records the ranking does not reach, so it may be higher still. Any ranking that does not merge spellings understates the companies that most often win under several names, and those tend to be the largest.
What the count hides
A count says how often a supplier wins, not from whom. Looking across each supplier's whole indexed record — every category and year Skim can attribute to it, not only IT in 2023 to 2025 — the leaders turn out to be very different kinds of competitor.
| Supplier | Awards in indexed record | From its largest buyer | That buyer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Permanent Futures | 116 | 100 | Police Digital Service |
| Dell Corporation | 219 | at least 94 | UK Shared Business Services |
| LA International Computer Consultants | 65 | at least 27 | UK Shared Business Services |
| IBM United Kingdom | 64 | 10, the largest visible | HM Revenue & Customs |
Permanent Futures ranks second on a record that is 86% one buyer: Police Digital Service awarded it 15 contracts in 2024, 28 in 2025 and 57 so far in 2026. That is a deep single relationship, not a broad presence across the sector. IBM, third as recorded, has its wins spread across HM Revenue & Customs, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Ministry of Defence and at least eight more. For most bidders, IBM is the broader competitor, though it ranks below a supplier that is not.
Dell and LA International sit between the two: a large share of each record comes from UK Shared Business Services, which buys on behalf of other public bodies, and the rest is spread widely. A buyer that buys for others turns one relationship into many awards.
What this means for a bidder
The competitor that matters is the one winning from your buyers, not the one at the top of a national list. Before treating a name as a threat, check whether its record overlaps with the buyers you bid to. A supplier whose wins come overwhelmingly from one organisation is formidable at that organisation and largely absent everywhere else.
A high count built on repeated small awards from one buyer usually means a call-off arrangement under a framework. Competing with it means getting onto that framework, or winning that buyer's next competition, rather than out-bidding the supplier across the market. A spread record means the reverse: a competitor you will meet in many places, and one whose strengths are worth studying before you meet it.
What this data cannot tell you
Every count is a floor. The ranking counts awards whose supplier carries a company identifier, and many published awards do not. Suppliers that often win without one are undercounted.
Records split. IBM appears under at least four records in the underlying data and LA International under three; the ranking merges the records it shows, but a record outside the top ten cannot be merged in. Either could rank higher than shown, and either could be first.
The buyer shares are drawn from each supplier's whole record, across every category, so they describe how a supplier wins in general rather than within IT alone. Where the record is truncated they are stated as at least.
A count is not a value. A single award can be a laptop order or a ten-year outsourcing contract, and this ranking weighs them equally. That is deliberate: published award values include framework ceilings spread across every supplier appointed to them, which makes a value ranking far less reliable than a count.
FAQ
How do I see which competitors are winning UK public sector contracts in my sector?
Search awarded notices on Contracts Finder and Find a Tender by your CPV code, export them, and count awards per supplier after merging different spellings of the same company. Then group each leading supplier's awards by buyer: a count shows how often a supplier wins, and the buyer spread shows whether it is a competitor you will meet widely or a specialist in one relationship.
Who wins the most UK public sector IT contracts?
The largest supplier records by award count from 2023 to 2025 are Dell Corporation with 45, Permanent Futures with 43, IBM United Kingdom with 39 across two merged records, and LA International Computer Consultants with 32. IBM and LA International both have further records the ranking does not show, so the order at the top is not settled. All four counts are floors.
Why rank suppliers by award count rather than contract value?
Because published values are distorted by framework agreements, which publish a ceiling covering every supplier appointed to them rather than work any one supplier holds. A single framework can attribute tens of billions of pounds to each of dozens of suppliers. A count has no such distortion, though it weighs a small order and a large contract equally.
How do I find out who holds a specific contract now?
The award notice names the winning supplier, and the contract details notice published under the Procurement Act 2023 confirms the contract that followed. Where a contract has been extended or varied, a later change notice shows whether the same supplier is still in place.
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