ABERDEEN firm Escape Business Technologies said yesterday it has secured £500,000 of information technology contracts since the start of its financial year on April 1, including projects for the installation of VMware virtualisation technology.

The technology firm is the only Aberdeen-based company to obtain VMware authorised consultant (VAC) accreditation.

It said contracts had been won thanks to a lot of new clients coming on board, with deals ranging from one year to three.

Escape’s contract wins have included projects to help provide upgrade and IT-support services internationally, and this has involved engineers working in America, Australia, Norway and Spain.

The company, which has a payroll of 30, also said it had plans to increase staffing in future to match its growing workload. It also intends to open an office in Perth, Australia later this year.

Escape is expected to report an increase in turnover to £2.5million in the year to April 1, 2008, up 25% on the year before.

Director Robin Parkinson said: “The work we have secured over the past month has been incredibly positive. We constantly strive to offer the latest technology to ensure our clients are getting the best service possible and keep us ahead in a competitive market.

“VMware has been embraced by many of our clients and its ‘green’ benefits are really being noticed. We are looking forward to more successes in 2008.”

VMware enables companies to cut down the number of servers they need, taking up less space, and is said to reduce energy consumption and carbon footprint by up to 90%. It also cuts down on downtime needed and any risk of losing data.