PALO ALTO, Calif.

HP Enterprise Services today announced a three-year, $123 million technology services agreement with California’s Welfare Client Data Systems (WCDS) Consortium intended to enhance service delivery to the state’s welfare clients and improve staff productivity.

Building on a 25-year relationship, the extended agreement provides applications development, network and server management services for WCDS’ CalWorks Information Network (CalWIN). Developed and managed by HP, CalWIN is an automated health and welfare eligibility determination system that services more than 850 sites across 18 California counties and is the largest system of its kind in the United States.

CalWIN processes an average of 13 million transactions per day for public assistance programs, including California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids, food stamps, Medi-Cal and adoption assistance. The solution enables more than 30,000 county workers to quickly and accurately deliver benefits to more than 2.6 million families in need. Within this network, HP produces more than 3.6 million pieces of client correspondence per month.

“With HP as our technology partner, consortium members are confident that CalWIN will support the state’s growing needs in administering benefits while using tax dollars wisely,” said Bob Hendricks, executive director, WCDS. “As the economy fluctuates, speed and efficiency are critical in providing welfare services to California residents in need.”

The agreement will allow flexible capacity for CalWIN to handle increasing case volume. HP will continue to manage the CalWIN system and the servers on which the system resides. Using the HP Designed for Run strategy, the extension provides WCDS with a clear path for achieving the transformation and modernization of CalWIN that the consortium desires.

Specific plans underway are targeted at the utilization of web-based technology to enable the use of enhanced self-service capabilities and improve the worker experience. These efforts improve the overall effectiveness of CalWIN while helping to control costs and improve productivity.

“It is imperative that health and welfare workers have access to reliable information so people in need receive the appropriate benefits,” said Barbara Anderson, vice president, State and Local Health and Human Services, HP Enterprise Services. “HP has deep industry, applications and infrastructure experience to ensure that CalWIN provides the necessary information to workers managing the growing case volume.”

“HP has been a valued partner of this consortium for many years. This extension continues that partnership in one of the most challenging times our counties have faced in delivering the services many Californians count on,” said Joe Valentine, executive director for Contra Costa County and chair, WCDS Consortium. “HP is helping us meet the increasing needs for services in a time when budget dollars are limited.”

Additionally, HP will provide enterprise server infrastructure as part of the agreement. HP Agility Alliance partners will provide other tools, technologies and resources in support of CalWIN, including Microsoft for software and operating systems and Oracle for database, data warehousing and middleware.

HP Enterprise Services founded the healthcare IT services industry more than 45 years ago. Today, HP touches more than 200 million lives daily and each year performs 2.4 billion healthcare transactions, including 1 billion healthcare claims.

HP is the nation’s largest provider of Medicaid and Medicare process management services, administering $95 billion in benefits a year and serves as fiscal agent or principal IT provider for Medicaid in 22 states. HP’s global healthcare experience spans payer, provider, government and life science communities.