South & Vale Councils

The client and the challenge

South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse District Councils (South & Vale) are neighbouring authorities that work in partnership to deliver services efficiently across both districts. With over 650 employees and 74 elected councillors, the councils provide a range of services to their citizens, including planning and building control, waste and recycling, and community safety. By sharing services, the councils seek to balance cost-effectiveness with high-quality public service.

After nearly a decade of operating under a fully outsourced IT model, South & Vale faced a pivotal moment. Their long-term managed services contract was coming to an end, and the Councils’ new Technology Strategy identified a need to bring IT in-house to regain flexibility and control.

“We’d spent years under a fully managed IT services contract where the provider did all of the work for us,” explains Simon Turner, IT and Digital Services Manager at South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse District Councils. “The contract simply wasn’t flexible enough to provide the kind of IT that councils need today. There were several partners and other councils within the same contract, so every ask became a negotiation. If we wanted to change something, we needed to get every council on board, as it would be rolled out to them too. Everything took much longer than we wanted.

“Our IT needs at the start of the contract were very different to what we need today,” Simon continues. “Ultimately, we needed the flexibility to be able to change our technology stack at pace when business needs required us to. So, we decided to bring everything in-house, as the Councils’ Technology Strategy recommended.”

Our solution

In preparation for the managed service contract ending in September 2025, Simon dedicated the prior two years to carefully building an in-house IT team and laying the foundations for a modern, future-ready digital infrastructure. This meant moving away from its legacy managed service model and creating a brand-new IT ecosystem, one designed to empower people, simplify operations, and support growth for years to come.

“We had deployed Microsoft 365 in 2015, so we wanted to stay with the Microsoft Suite,” explains Simon. “However, there was a lot of work to be done to create our own IT ecosystem. Our in-house team had plenty of technical skills, but we knew the migration would be complex, so we wanted to find an expert Microsoft partner to ensure best practices and a smooth migration.

“We went through the standard procurement process, and Node4 really stood out to us,” Simon adds. “They clearly had the skillset to help us build the platform that we envisioned, and, with many Microsoft accreditations to their name, including being part of the Inner Circle, it gave us confidence that they were the right partner.”

Working in close collaboration, Node4 helped South & Vale executed a multi-faceted transformation programme.

Microsoft 365 tenant review and security optimisation
Node4 conducted a full audit of the Microsoft 365 environment to ensure security, governance, and compliance with Microsoft best practices. “The first piece was to take control of our Microsoft 365 tenant,” Simon recalls. “Node4 reviewed the tenant and made sure that it was safe, secure, and aligned with best practices. This was a crucial foundation for the rest of the project, and Node4’s Microsoft expertise was essential to its success.”

Device migration and Windows 11 rollout
Another key part of the project was device migration, as South & Vale had 800 laptops that were on its previous provider’s network. All intellectual property had to be removed, and the laptops had to be reimaged and rebuilt to join the new network.

“We also took this opportunity to migrate from Windows 10 to Windows 11,” notes Simon. “Node4 developed the Windows 11 package and built the Intune Autopilot platform so that the devices could be onboarded, rebuilt and reimaged in a standardised and efficient manner. This enabled us to rebuild 800 laptops in just four weeks.”

Simon Turner, IT and Digital Services Manager at South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse District Councils

Teams telephony implementation
Node4 deployed Teams Calling to replace the legacy telephony platform, integrating it with South & Vale’s contact centre for a seamless user experience. It now supports 790 users with fully configured hunt groups, voicemail, and PSTN via Node4’s Direct Routing platform.

Server migration to Microsoft Azure
As part of the exit plan, 14 legacy servers also needed to be migrated from the old provider’s data centres into Azure. Simon reflects that this part of the project was “the biggest bit of work and most crucial to get right. If we lost the servers, we would lose the data from some of the Councils’ most crucial applications.” 

Simon recalls the challenges faced: “Both of our teams were working in a foreign environment, and there was a lot of configuration work needed to make the transition to Azure. One of the applications we were migrating is 30 years old and highly embedded across the authorities, so making it work properly was complex. But through collaboration and careful planning, we did it. Everything came across cleanly, including our oldest, most critical applications.”

Results

Early delivery with uninterrupted operations
Although South & Vale’s contract with its previous provider ended on September 30th 2025, they had ambitions to be off the old platforms by the end of July. But the entire migration was completed even ahead of the early deadline. Simon recalls that “by the end of June, people were no longer logging in to the old systems. In July, everything was switched off, and we were working in our own environment.”

The migration project was seamless, with no downtime or outages. “There was no downtime at all,” Simon recalls. “The day we switched over the telephony sticks in my mind in particular, as no calls went missing, which is quite unusual. You usually get some disruption when people try to call and can’t get through, but we haven’t had any complaints.”

Flexibility, control and innovation
Out of the legacy contract and in complete control of its IT environment, South & Vale is now reaping the benefits. The biggest difference Simon has noticed is the flexibility and agility that it provides the IT team: “We’re now in control. We can deploy technology to meet business needs as they arise, at pace.

“It also allows us to be proactive and embrace new technology as it emerges,” he continues. “We don’t have to wait weeks for it to be implemented. We can do it immediately and keep pace with the market. We can now lead the way, not trail behind.”

Simon Turner, IT and Digital Services Manager at South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse District Councils

The new IT environment has also laid the foundations for future growth and innovation for South & Vale, and Simon is already working with Node4 to expand its technology stack.

“We’re already discussing the potential to use the latest AI tools and deploy Copilot and Power BI,” explains Simon. “Node4 is helping us realise the possibilities within the Microsoft suite, build out these platforms according to business need and ensure they are used safely and under proper governance.” 

An extended IT team
The project was defined by the strong partnership formed by Node4 and South & Vale, with true collaboration at its centre.

“Both teams worked collaboratively,” Simon notes. “We were heavily reliant on Node4’s technical expertise, and they relied on our local knowledge. It was absolutely a partnership.”

He also highlights the value of collaborative planning in making the project a success: “We went through detailed high-level and low-level designs. Everyone knew what we were trying to achieve, so there were no surprises. The communication was great throughout. Everyone listened, everyone delivered, and whenever there was a challenge, they fixed it quickly. This allowed us to maintain momentum and keep hitting the deadlines. It was such a collaborative project.”

The partnership was also expanded during the project to include database administration services, providing access to specialist expertise without the cost of full-time resources.

“It came about from a conversation when I realised that we had two business-critical databases which were managed by our previous provider that would no longer be covered,” Simon recalls. “I was concerned about their maintenance going forward, and Node4 referred me to their data services team, who could take it on as a database admin role. It’s a real value-add for us, I couldn’t pay for that resource internally, and I’m getting much more value for money by utilising Node4’s offering.”

He concludes: “That’s proof of how valuable it is working with a managed service provider with a wide breadth of services; there is nothing that they can’t help us with!”