Microsoft announces UK cloud services to be used by Ministry of Defence

The facilities in London, Durham and Cardiff are supposed to allow the company to sell online services to public and private sector entities with sensitive data needs.

The UK's Ministry of Defence is one of the customers that will use the new local offices to run operations through the internet.

Mike Stone, chief information officer for the MoD told the BBC that its previous software was not up to scratch.

"We were still on Windows XP, for instance, and all of the applications were from 2003 or prior to that," Stone said.

"We can now work on documents collaboratively and understand more about the ways we are working - we will be able to see how much time teams are spending in meetings, on email and on the phone."

Other initial entities signed up to the services include an NHS trust, Aston Martin and Capita.