Eduserv is a professional IT services company dedicated to the public benefit, reinvesting surpluses into service development and education. The report highlights its impact across various sectors including education, government, charity, and healthcare, with particular emphasis on cost savings and enhanced digital engagement through its OpenAthens identity and access management service. Looking ahead, Eduserv aims to support more public good organizations by maximizing the value of technology in their operations.

1. Impact
Report
2015

2. Making better
use of technology
for public good
Eduserv is a different sort of
organisation. We’re a professional
IT services company entirely
dedicated to public benefit.
Our assets are held in trust, and any
surpluses we make are reinvested in
service development and education.
This report is about our impact in the
sectors we serve and our plans for
the future.
Philip French (Chair) and
Stephen Butcher (CEO)

3. Contents
Education 5
Government 6
Charity 9
Healthcare 10
Values 12
Figures 14
People 16
History 18
Our impact
at a glance
page 5
page 6
page 9
page 10
Helping Leicester University
save money and make
better use of technology
Supporting business
transformation through
cloud technology for Bristol
City Council
A mobile-ready website and
personalised user content
for the British Red Cross
Easy access to online
resources for healthcare
workers
3www.eduserv.org.uk

4. OpenAthens has enabled single sign-on
access to Library e-resources and other
University services. It makes things so
much easier for our staff and students.
Richard Taylor, Deputy Director of Library & Learning Services,
Bath Spa University
www.eduserv.org.uk4

5. Our OpenAthens services and Chest Agreements
help almost every university and college in the UK
to make their budgets go further and to improve
their access to online resources. Now we’re also
helping them develop their digital engagement.
So, for example, the University of Leicester:
1. Saves time and money with our software and online
resource licences. We estimate the university saves at least
£250,000 per year through our negotiations.
2. Uses our OpenAthens identity and access management
service to help provide its 15,700 staff and students with
easy access to subscribed resources whether on campus
or elsewhere.
3. Is developing their digital engagement, commissioning us to
migrate their website to an enterprise content management
system. We’re working collaboratively with their in-house
development team to ensure they are fully equipped to
support, and further develop, their site to meet their needs
in the future.
Education
Quick Facts:
●● Over 4 million people in 33 countries
use OpenAthens, our identity and
access management service.
●● We saved universities and colleges
£46 million in licencing costs in 2014.
OpenAthens makes
managing access to
hundreds of resources,
for thousands of students, much
more manageable. It also means
that students only need one user
name and password to access all
online resources.
Joanne Dunham, Head of Collections &
Information Systems, University of Leicester
We really value the
Eduserv licence negotiation
service. It means we can
provide our students and researchers
with industry-leading software and extra
benefits like the home use rights. The
licence terms make my job easier and
make campus-wide use affordable.
Sue Preston, Software Manager
IT Services, University of Leicester
Eduserv is helping us migrate our site
to new technology at the same time
as we train our in-house team. This
collaborative approach makes the work great value
and is helping us make better use of technology in
our digital communications.
Lee Knapton, Senior Project Manager
University of Leicester
www.eduserv.org.uk 5

6. Government departments and local authorities
need to cut costs and improve public services.
Our services help them do that by consolidating
their IT infrastructure and migrating to the cloud.
Over the past year, we’ve worked with a number of
government organisations including departments,
local authorities and agencies.
Government
Supporting Bristol
City Council’s business
transformation through
the cloud
We’re helping Bristol to cut costs and
transform their digital service through
a period of managed migration from
in-house data centres to the cloud.
In February 2015, after several months
of careful planning, our team worked
from Friday evening into the early
hours of Monday to migrate Bristol’s
infrastructure, addressing problems
as they arose and ensuring there was
no disruption to council services.
By migrating our IT
estate to Eduserv’s data
centres we’re able to
make significant cost savings through
property rationalisation. The move
also means that the IT team can
focus on adding value to the way the
council uses IT rather than simply
managing the IT estate.
Ian Gale, ICT Service Delivery &
Integration Manager, Bristol City Council
www.eduserv.org.uk6

9. With reductions in funding and increased
pressure on budgets, the challenge for
charities to increase donations, improve
volunteer management, and enhance services
to beneficiaries has never been tougher.
We help charities get the right digital and IT strategy in
place, in order to engage more effectively online and to
boost performance, while cutting costs on their hosting
and infrastructure.
We work hard to understand charities’ needs and to
share lessons across the sector, and we were delighted
to win the Charity Times ‘Technology Provider of the
Year’ award in May 2015. Our charity clients include
Alzheimer’s Society, the British Red Cross, Marie Curie
and Drinkaware.
Enhancing the British Red
Cross’ digital strategy with
a mobile-ready website and
personalised user content
To help the British Red Cross
get the most out of their digital
communications we’ve optimised
their main site for access from
mobile devices, making it quick
and easy for users to navigate and
donate. A new GPS feature provides
information based on location.
Working with the British Red Cross,
we’ve helped ensure:
●● the website detects and optimises
for any mobile device;
●● users can find services more easily;
●● the mobile site drives visitors to
their shops;
●● fewer call-centre calls and easier
content updates, meaning real
efficiency savings.
Only needing to edit
content once for both
sites makes it efficient
to manage and ensures users get a
consistent message.
Margaret O’Donnell, Head of Digital,
the British Red Cross
From the nearest
wheelchair loan facility
to mobility aids and
support at home, with just two clicks
I can find all the help and support I
need for my elderly mother on my
mobile. I even use the site to find the
British Red Cross charity shops when
I’m visiting other towns.
Joanne, mobile site user
Charity
www.eduserv.org.uk 9

10. Access to the right information at the right time is critical
to delivering efficient and effective health services.
The NHS spends millions on subscriptions to vital information
resources for their staff. Maximising the value they get
from these resources is key, but ensuring easy access to
hundreds of online resources for thousands of staff is a
significant challenge.
The OpenAthens identity and access management service
makes it easier to to provide the right users with the right access,
reducing administration overheads and providing a seamless
experience for users wherever they are.
Hundreds of thousands of NHS staff and clinicians rely on
OpenAthens for their access to resources.
Healthcare
OpenAthens users are able to
do their jobs more efficiently,
freeing up precious time and
resources whether using the service for
professional development, on ward rounds,
or in Accident & Emergency departments.
Alexia Tonnel, Director,
Evidence Resources, NICE
OpenAthens worldwide
The OpenAthens identity and access
management service is not just an
authentication tool for the UK.
It is used in 33 countries worldwide,
helping students, researchers and
clinicians access the information
that is vital to their roles.
Users love OpenAthens
because it gives them
seamless, remote access
to our many resources.
Pat Regenberg, Library Manager,
Overlook Medical Center,
Health Sciences Library, USA
www.eduserv.org.uk10

12. Committed
We care about the public benefit that our customers
provide and our first priority is to help them deliver
better services. That’s why we exist; it’s why working
at Eduserv is about more than a pay cheque. We care
about our customers and about each other, and we
hope that comes across in our approach.
Living our values
It’s commonplace now for organisations to proclaim their values:
for us it’s vital that we make commonplace words real, understand
what they mean for us, and keep checking how we measure up:
Professional
We seek to hire and develop talented people; people
who are ambitious to grow. We strive to understand
our customers’ needs better, to exploit technology
better, and to ensure we give ever better value for
money to the organisations we serve. We aim for
consistently high quality and great customer service.
www.eduserv.org.uk12

13. Collaborative
We aim to be supportive and straightforward in
everything we do. We work alongside our customers
to help them understand their costs, challenges,
risks and opportunities, and develop solutions that
help them achieve their business aims.
Making the most
of our independence
Eduserv cannot be bought or sold – unlike
most medium sized technology providers.
This means we can, and do, prioritise long-
term relationships over short-term earnings.
It also means our customers can be sure we will still
be here tomorrow, as an independent, self-sufficient
enterprise, dedicated to their interests. And it means
our staff have the confidence that Eduserv will
continue to be their employer, allowing them to focus
on developing and delivering valuable services.
By focusing on our values and
continually improving, we’ll enable
more organisations to make better
use of technology for public good.
Stephen Butcher, CEO
www.eduserv.org.uk 13

14. Being business-like
Eduserv stands out as a charity
working in a competitive and
changing landscape and making
such a positive difference to the customers
it works with. I really enjoy seeing the value
Eduserv creates in very important areas.
Tony Mather, Trustee
We have great ideals – to make a big
difference to the organisations we serve,
so that they can make a bigger difference
to those they serve. But we can only do
this if we’re effective and efficient.
Managing our resources sensibly, investing well,
and contracting prudently is key to ensuring that
we continue to provide exceptional services in
the future.
In 2013/14 we generated a trading surplus of
£257,000 and we expect to make a surplus of not
less than £400,000 in 2014/2015. These surpluses
contribute to a reserve for capital investment,
for our planned education programme, and for
pension liabilities.
www.eduserv.org.uk14

15. Making a surplus most of the time is
important for us, but it’s not enough.
Our mission is to help organisations make better
use of technology for public benefit, and our
ambition is to increase both the number of public
good organisations we support and the value
we bring them.
These organisations choose to use us rather than
our commercial competitors, and the net value of
our services to them provides some measure of the
benefit we’re delivering to them.
In 2013/2014, this grew by 11% and, in 2014/15,
we expect growth to exceed 20%.
Unlike most commercial organisations
of our size, we’re happy to continue
providing a diverse range of services, as
long as each of those services is fulfilling
our mission and is sustainable.
Our understanding of the challenges faced in the
sectors we serve informs how our services develop –
understanding what kind of software agreements
our universities need, or what hinders their more
effective use of online content; understanding how
digital technologies can best help charities engage and
operate; and understanding how cloud technologies
can best support citizen services in an unforgiving
economic climate.
As an organisation constituted to serve the public
rather than shareholders, our privilege is to address
these agendas with a view to maximising the value
we deliver rather than the surplus we make, and our
ambition is to continue increasing that value at pace.
Growing Looking Ahead
0
3
6
9
12
15
2015forecast
£13M
2014
£10.5M
2013
£9.5M
NetIncome
£M
www.eduserv.org.uk 15

16. Eduserv has grown significantly over
the years and now employs over 160
staff. We seek to recruit and develop
talented people who share our
purpose of using IT for public good.
We’re really proud of the staff we
have and recognise that we couldn’t
help our customers use technology
more effectively without them.
Our people
Trustees
Eduserv’s Trustees are all volunteers and are all senior,
respected figures in their industries. Our current
Trustees are:
It is amazing what 21st
century IT can offer
public and not-for-
profit sector organisations. However
it is so often mismanaged. I joined
Eduserv as a Trustee as it is a charity
with a clear remit to help these
organisations make IT work. It is a
privilege to work with a team that
does make a difference.
John Tate, Trustee
Philip French, Chair
Chief Technology Officer,
SSCL Transformation,
Sopra Steria
Ceri Carlill
Industry Value Engineering,
SAP
Jos Creese
CEO,
Creese Consulting
www.eduserv.org.uk16

17. The combination of bright, hardworking people, a strong team of executives and
trustees, technical excellence and a powerful not-for-profit ethos makes chairing
Eduserv’s trustee board both engrossing and invigorating.
Philip French, Chair
Graham Gilbert
Chair,
York EMC Services
Jillian Moore
UK Client services Partner,
Slalom Consulting
Paul Greatrix
Registrar,
University of Nottingham
John Tate
CEO,
Tate Technology Ltd
Tony Mather
Group Business
Transformation Director,
Musgrave
I am delighted to have the
chance to contribute to
Eduserv’s growing success by
bringing ideas, challenge and experience to
complement the immense talent of its existing
internal teams.
Jos Creese, Trustee
www.eduserv.org.uk 17

18. Our history
Athens becomes
OpenAthens,
supporting
open identity
management
standards.
2007
Athens reaches
the 2 million
user mark.
2006
Sitecore
Content
Management
System
is adopted
by our web
development
team.
2005
We move from
University of
Bath premises
to independent
offices in the
centre of Bath.
2001
Athens is adopted
by the NHS
Hosting of school
performance
tables is followed
by development of
the infrastructure
for UK Online,
the government’s
precursor to
DirectGov.
2000
A period of growth for Chest and
NISS. Online resources are added
to Chest portfolio.
NISS develops expertise in web
content management and hosting.
Athens is developed in response
to a need for controlled access
to online resources.
In 1999 Eduserv is established as
a registered charity, governed
by Trustees.
1990-1999
The Combined Higher
Education Software
Team (Chest) and the
National Information
on Software and
Services (NISS)
initiatives are launched.
1980-1989
Web hosting grows
dramatically. Major
clients include
central government
departments and
national non-
departmental
public bodies.
2003
www.eduserv.org.uk18

19. Eduserv becomes AWS
Partner and launches
Assured Hybrid Cloud.
Winner of ‘Tech Provider
of the Year’ in the
Charity Times Better
Society Awards.
Over 1000 virtual machines
under management.
Collaborative digital
development work begins
with University of Leicester.
2015
Our Cloud Services are
awarded Pan Government
Accreditation up to IL3.
Global OpenAthens
partnership with EBSCO.
Eduserv Chest Agreements
help save universities and
colleges £46 million
a year.
Bristol City Council and
Brighton & Hove City
Council become customers.
2014
Our cloud Services
are awarded
Pan Government
Accredication up to IL2.
British Library chooses
Eduserv as its Sitecore
CMS provider.
Our new Adobe ELA
Chest Agreement saves
up to 70% for universities
and colleges.
NHS extends its
OpenAthens contract.
2013
We gain ISO27001
certification and join
the G-Cloud and JANET
frameworks.
Our site for Scottish
Water wins Public Sector
Site of the Year in the
Sitecore Awards.
Eduserv is a Best Cloud
Provider finalist in the
2012 UK IT Awards.
2012
The Microsoft Campus
Chest Agreement saves
UK HE/FE £1million
this year and the APA
agreement £2million
over three years.
Our data centre
expands including
a 10Gb JANET PoP.2011
Eduserv partners with
InferMed to deliver the
new NHS Direct site
which goes on to win the
eGovernment Awards.
A new Chest Agreement
is negotiated with
Sophos, the UK security
software company.
2010
Eduserv moves
into its current
home at Royal
Mead, Bath and
builds its new
data centre
in Swindon.
2009
Our Government
Ready Platform
is developed.
2008

20. www.eduserv.org.uk
Get involved
Can you help us?
Whilst we don’t have a volunteering programme,
we regularly recruit Trustees and are always on
the look out for talented staff who are committed
to IT for public good. For more information see
www.eduserv.org.uk/jobs
Can we help you?
If you’re serving citizens, students or beneficiaries
and need some help making the best use of
technology then we’d like to talk to you. You can
find out more about the services we provide at
www.eduserv.org.uk.
EDU-101.0