The country's leading vendors, TCS, Infosys and Wipro, along with global giants IBM Corporation and Accenture, have successfully bagged a 5-year outsourcing contract from the world's largest oil and Gas Company, British Petroleum. BP spokesperson Mr. David Nicholas said: "With the new contract, we have brought down our vendor base to five from 42 worldwide."

Mr. David said that the firm, which has consolidated its IT business, expects a saving worth $500 million by outsourcing. There is no official word about the size of deal, but global IT service providers are said to have paid more than Indian vendors.

IBM and Accenture will handle enterprise applications, while other vendors will provide ADAM services to the oil giant. IBM, which has been awarded desktop responsibilities, said: "The contract is the largest among multiple awards BP is making as part of a major program to simultaneously simplify business processes and achieve new levels of service quality."

TCS and Infosys will handle services such as corporate IT, manufacturing, refining and other ADAM operations including integrated supply, trading, exploration, and production business. Wipro has been selected for fuels value chain and corporate businesses.

Mr S. Sabyasachi, partner at Tholons Inc, an IT advisory firm said: "The deal is strategic and significant from European manufacturing perspective. It is going to be a catalyst for the next few quarters."