I admit it, I spoke too soon…

After wishing everyone in the UK a great weekend in the sun, the British weather has come back to haunt me. So to lift the gloom that miserable British weather can inspire I thought I would start this week’s round-up with a warming piece from the beautiful Caribbean.

Caribbean-based BPO provider, e-Services Group International, has been acquired by Affiliated Computer Services for US $85 million.

The US-based BP/ITO provider, ACS, has netted an additional 4,000 English-speaking staff based in Jamaica and St. Lucia. The company also hopes the deal will enhance ACS’s ability to handle complex business functions from a location convenient to the Americas and Europe. Just writing the words Jamaica and St. Lucia brings a ray of sunshine into the sourcingfocus.com news room.

From the slightly less tropical world of Gartner, has arrived a serious chunk of research on IT services outsourcing. No doom and gloom in this study thankfully - at least for end users. Gartner has anticipated a fall in IT service prices of around 5 percent down to 20 percent during 2009 and 2010. The analyst house said IT outsourcing prices are likely to decrease during the next two years due to the uncertain economic climate, IT budget constraints and general market consciousness.

They claim that cost-focused buying behaviors in the current economic phase will be a key factor behind the reductions for IT infrastructure outsourcing services, with a great variability based on each single deal.

Another IT related union has come in the unlikely form of North Somerset Council and Kainos. Best known for its wool and cheeses, the rural district of Somerset is not associated with high-tech, fast paced, city life.

However, this week saw Kainos, an IT consultancy, win a contract with North Somerset Council to implement its electronic document and records management system (EDRMS). Things are looking up for Somerset.

Kainos was awarded the contract following a market tender which attracted a number of supplier responses. The deal was sealed after North Somerset Council held reference discussions with Havant Council, another user of Kainos’ services.

To finish off, despite the gloom things are looking up at BT. Executives at the telecommunications giant will no doubt be toasting themselves with a few beers after landing a sizeable $120m deal with SABMiller, one of the world’s largest brewers.

SABMiller have brewing interests and distribution agreements across six continents. BT will deliver network and telecommunications services for the brewing giant, across the Latin American and European regions.

BT will provide and manage the company’s communications and networked IT Services needs in Latin America as well as global connectivity services into North America, South Africa, and Hong Kong. And I thought BT struggled to manage telecommunications in just one country.

While the weather’s looked increasingly bad, the week’s actually been fairly positive for outsourcing. Since when has a bit of rain stopped us? Have a good weekend.