MPLS Contracts

The following table provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for MPLS skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that have cited MPLS over the 3 months to 23 June 2017 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

Note that daily and hourly rates are treated separately in these statistics. When calculating contractor rate percentiles, daily rates are never derived from quoted hourly rates or vice versa.

Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) UK
Location	3 months to 23 Jun 2017	Same period 2016	Same period 2015
Rank	351	337	301
Rank change year-on-year	-14	-36
Contract jobs citing MPLS	268	338	402
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK	0.57%	0.63%	0.72%
As % of the Communications & Networking category	4.22%	3.89%	4.95%
Number of daily rates quoted	161	198	248
Median daily rate	£400	£388	£358
Median daily rate % change year-on-year	+3.22%	+8.39%
90% offered a daily rate of more than	£246	£270	£288
10% offered a daily rate of more than	£581	£550	£475
UK excluding London median daily rate	£375	£375	£350
% change year-on-year	-	+7.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted	10	11	6
Median hourly rate	£38.80	£47.83	£45.00
Median hourly rate % change year-on-year	-18.88%	+6.28%
90% offered a hourly rate of more than	£13.50	£26.00	£26.50
10% offered a hourly rate of more than	£80.20	£48.00	£150.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£44.60	£47.83	£50.00
% change year-on-year	-6.76%	-4.34%

MPLS is in the communications and computer networking skills category. The next table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with a requirement for communications and computer networking skills.

Contract Communications & Computer Network Skills UK
Contract job vacancies with a requirement for communications and computer networking skills	6347	8686	8118
As % of all contract IT job vacancies advertised in the UK	13.56%	16.14%	14.45%
Number of daily rates quoted	3768	5279	4580
Median daily rate	£400	£389	£360
Median daily rate % change year-on-year	+2.82%	+8.05%
90% offered a daily rate of more than	£213	£240	£213
10% offered a daily rate of more than	£550	£550	£500
UK excluding London median daily rate	£375	£365	£347
% change year-on-year	+2.73%	+5.04%
Number of hourly rates quoted	395	426	473
Median hourly rate	£27.50	£29.00	£24.00
Median hourly rate % change year-on-year	-5.17%	+20.83%
90% offered a hourly rate of more than	£12.25	£13.00	£13.00
10% offered a hourly rate of more than	£50.00	£47.83	£47.67
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£27.50	£32.50	£26.00
% change year-on-year	-15.38%	+25.00%

MPLS
Job Vacancy Trend

The job posting trend of jobs advertised citing MPLS as a proportion of all contract or permanent IT jobs with a match in the Communications & Networking category.

MPLS
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

This chart provides the 3-month moving average for daily rates quoted in contract jobs citing MPLS.

Contractor daily rate trend for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Contractor Daily Rate Histogram

The daily rate distribution of IT jobs citing MPLS over the 3 months to 23 June 2017.

Contractor daily rate histogram for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

This chart provides the 3-month moving average for contractor hourly rates quoted in IT jobs citing MPLS.

Contractor hourly rate trend for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Contractor Hourly Rate Histogram

The hourly rate distribution of IT jobs citing MPLS over the 3 months to 23 June 2017.

Contractor hourly rate histogram for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Top 30 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing MPLS within the UK over the 3 months to 23 June 2017. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 3 month period last year.

Location	Rank Change on Same Period Last Year	Matching Contract IT Job Ads	Median Daily Rate Last 3 Months	Median Daily Rate % Change on Same Period Last Year	Live Job Vacancies
England	-26	242	£404	+3.19%	83
London	-12	102	£485	+14.45%	26
South East	-20	78	£400	+5.96%	21
Hampshire	+11	28	£425	+26.58%	5
North West	+28	26	£288	-28.12%	13
Berkshire	-4	24	£394	+12.57%	5
Manchester	+19	20	£257	-39.64%	11
Scotland	+53	19	£242	-
City of London	-1	16	£413	+6.45%	8
South West	-13	14	£370	+2.06%	1
Yorkshire	+24	9	£375	+6.99%	5
Edinburgh	+20	9	£275	-
West Sussex	+18	9	£395	+8.21%	2
Basingstoke	+1	9	£425	+93.18%	2
West Yorkshire	+22	8	£403	+0.62%	3
Leeds	+13	8	£403	+0.62%
Glasgow	-	8	£232	-
Wiltshire	+4	7	£353	-2.75%
Reading	-2	7	£494	+45.22%	2
Kent	-	7	£413	-	4
Winchester	+11	6	£400	-
Oxfordshire	-7	6	£433	+33.07%	2
Bracknell	+9	5	£485	+43.70%
Crawley	+5	5	£395	-16.84%
East of England	-12	5	£325	-34.27%	4
Bristol	-7	4	£370	-0.67%	1
Buckinghamshire	-21	4	-	-	1
Dartford	-	4	£425	-
Maidenhead	-	4	£360	-
West Midlands	+3	3	£450	+12.50%	8

MPLS
Top 30 Co-occurring IT Skills

For the 6 months to 23 June 2017, IT contractor jobs citing MPLS also mentioned the following skills in order of popularity. The figures indicate the number co-occurrences and its proportion to all contract ads with a requirement for MPLS.

1	388 (71.19%)	Cisco
2	286 (52.48%)	Firewall
3	265 (48.62%)	Cisco Certification
4	250 (45.87%)	WAN
5	241 (44.22%)	BGP
6	217 (39.82%)	OSPF
7	214 (39.27%)	LAN
8	201 (36.88%)	VPN
9	192 (35.23%)	CCNP
10	160 (29.36%)	Data Centre
11	143 (26.24%)	Juniper
12	139 (25.50%)	TCP/IP
13	123 (22.57%)	Wireless
14	119 (21.83%)	Cisco Nexus
15	114 (20.92%)	F5

16	100 (18.35%)	CCIE
17	99 (18.17%)	CheckPoint
18	98 (17.98%)	DNS
19	95 (17.43%)	Telecoms
19	95 (17.43%)	VLAN
20	93 (17.06%)	CCNA
21	91 (16.70%)	VMware
22	90 (16.51%)	Cisco ASA
23	85 (15.60%)	Network Security
24	84 (15.41%)	IPsec
25	82 (15.05%)	Network Design
26	75 (13.76%)	DHCP
27	74 (13.58%)	Ethernet
28	73 (13.39%)	ITIL
29	72 (13.21%)	Internet

MPLS
Co-occurring IT Skills by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same job type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
Applications
Business Applications
Cloud Services
Communications & Networking
Database & Business Intelligence
Development Applications
General
Job Titles
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
Miscellaneous
Operating Systems
Processes & Methodologies
Programming Languages
Qualifications
Quality Assurance & Compliance
System Software
Systems Management
Vendors

Application Platforms
1	21 (3.85%)	CMS
2	13 (2.39%)	SharePoint
3	12 (2.20%)	MS Exchange
4	9 (1.65%)	Blackberry Enterprise Server
4	9 (1.65%)	Exchange Server 2013
5	8 (1.47%)	Exchange Server 2010
6	7 (1.28%)	IIS
7	6 (1.10%)	Tomcat
8	4 (0.73%)	OpenStack
8	4 (0.73%)	Skype for Business
9	3 (0.55%)	Exchange Server 2007
9	3 (0.55%)	SAS
10	2 (0.37%)	Apache
10	2 (0.37%)	CICS
10	2 (0.37%)	JBoss
11	1 (0.18%)	CloudStack
11	1 (0.18%)	Confluence
11	1 (0.18%)	SharePoint 2010
11	1 (0.18%)	SharePoint 2013
11	1 (0.18%)	WebSphere

Applications
1	28 (5.14%)	MS Visio
2	13 (2.39%)	Microsoft Excel
2	13 (2.39%)	Microsoft Office
3	8 (1.47%)	Microsoft PowerPoint

Business Applications
1	10 (1.83%)	Payment Gateway
2	3 (0.55%)	Dynamics CRM
3	1 (0.18%)	Remedy ITSM
3	1 (0.18%)	SAP Oil and Gas

Cloud Services
1	45 (8.26%)	Microsoft Azure
2	26 (4.77%)	Amazon AWS
3	23 (4.22%)	Office 365
4	4 (0.73%)	AWS CloudFormation
4	4 (0.73%)	Azure Active Directory
4	4 (0.73%)	IaaS
4	4 (0.73%)	PaaS
5	3 (0.55%)	IBM Cloud
5	3 (0.55%)	SaaS
6	2 (0.37%)	Akamai
6	2 (0.37%)	Cloud Computing
7	1 (0.18%)	Amazon EC2
7	1 (0.18%)	Amazon S3
7	1 (0.18%)	Bluemix
7	1 (0.18%)	CloudFront
7	1 (0.18%)	Google Cloud Platform
7	1 (0.18%)	Mimecast
7	1 (0.18%)	OneDrive
7	1 (0.18%)	Route 53
7	1 (0.18%)	Virtual Private Cloud

Communications & Networking
1	286 (52.48%)	Firewall
2	250 (45.87%)	WAN
3	241 (44.22%)	BGP
4	217 (39.82%)	OSPF
5	214 (39.27%)	LAN
6	201 (36.88%)	VPN
7	139 (25.50%)	TCP/IP
8	123 (22.57%)	Wireless
9	119 (21.83%)	Cisco Nexus
10	98 (17.98%)	DNS
11	95 (17.43%)	VLAN
12	90 (16.51%)	Cisco ASA
13	85 (15.60%)	Network Security
14	84 (15.41%)	IPsec
15	75 (13.76%)	DHCP
16	74 (13.58%)	Ethernet
17	72 (13.21%)	Internet
18	65 (11.93%)	EIGRP
18	65 (11.93%)	VoIP
19	60 (11.01%)	Cisco IOS

Database & Business Intelligence
1	17 (3.12%)	SQL Server
2	3 (0.55%)	Amazon RDS
2	3 (0.55%)	MS Access
3	2 (0.37%)	DB2
3	2 (0.37%)	OLTP
3	2 (0.37%)	Redis
3	2 (0.37%)	SQL Server 2008
3	2 (0.37%)	SQL Server 2012

Development Applications
1	7 (1.28%)	VSS/SourceSafe
2	2 (0.37%)	JIRA
2	2 (0.37%)	Rational DOORS
2	2 (0.37%)	Sonatype Nexus

General
1	95 (17.43%)	Telecoms
2	50 (9.17%)	Finance
3	29 (5.32%)	Banking
4	21 (3.85%)	Retail
5	14 (2.57%)	Military
6	12 (2.20%)	Billing
7	10 (1.83%)	Marketing
8	8 (1.47%)	Multimedia
9	7 (1.28%)	Manufacturing
10	5 (0.92%)	Electronics
11	4 (0.73%)	Legal
12	3 (0.55%)	German Language
12	3 (0.55%)	Investment Banking
13	2 (0.37%)	Back Office
13	2 (0.37%)	Games
13	2 (0.37%)	Music Industry
13	2 (0.37%)	Retail Banking
14	1 (0.18%)	Advertising
14	1 (0.18%)	Aerospace
14	1 (0.18%)	Financial Institution

Job Titles
1	239 (43.85%)	Network Engineer
2	80 (14.68%)	Architect
3	58 (10.64%)	Cisco Engineer
4	57 (10.46%)	Network Architect
5	50 (9.17%)	Cisco Network Engineer
6	42 (7.71%)	Analyst
7	39 (7.16%)	Senior Network Engineer
8	32 (5.87%)	IP Engineer
9	28 (5.14%)	Support Engineer
10	25 (4.59%)	Design Engineer
10	25 (4.59%)	Network Analyst
11	24 (4.40%)	Network Support
12	22 (4.04%)	Infrastructure Engineer
13	21 (3.85%)	Network Support Engineer
14	19 (3.49%)	Network Specialist
15	18 (3.30%)	Firewall Engineer
16	17 (3.12%)	Consultant
16	17 (3.12%)	Project Manager
16	17 (3.12%)	Security Engineer
17	16 (2.94%)	Network Security Engineer

Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1	53 (9.72%)	802.1X
2	11 (2.02%)	Web Services
3	9 (1.65%)	Middleware
4	8 (1.47%)	SOAP
5	7 (1.28%)	.NET
6	3 (0.55%)	CGI
6	3 (0.55%)	JSON
7	2 (0.37%)	COM
7	2 (0.37%)	RESTful
7	2 (0.37%)	RFC 2544
7	2 (0.37%)	RFC 2547
7	2 (0.37%)	SAP Basis
7	2 (0.37%)	XML
7	2 (0.37%)	XMPP
8	1 (0.18%)	Core Data
8	1 (0.18%)	JMS
8	1 (0.18%)	LAMP
8	1 (0.18%)	Managed Extensibility Framework
8	1 (0.18%)	REST
8	1 (0.18%)	WAP

Miscellaneous
1	160 (29.36%)	Data Centre
2	65 (11.93%)	Analytical Skills
3	14 (2.57%)	CMDB
4	13 (2.39%)	Foreign Exchange (FX)
4	13 (2.39%)	Hybrid Cloud
4	13 (2.39%)	Video Conferencing
5	12 (2.20%)	Computer Science
5	12 (2.20%)	IVR
5	12 (2.20%)	Management Information System
6	11 (2.02%)	Clustering
7	8 (1.47%)	Virtual Team
8	7 (1.28%)	BBC
9	6 (1.10%)	Mainframe
9	6 (1.10%)	Private Cloud
10	5 (0.92%)	CESG
10	5 (0.92%)	Greenfield Project
10	5 (0.92%)	Public Cloud
10	5 (0.92%)	Smart Meter
11	4 (0.73%)	Replication
11	4 (0.73%)	Smartphone

Operating Systems
1	71 (13.03%)	Windows
2	40 (7.34%)	Windows Server
3	36 (6.61%)	Linux
4	25 (4.59%)	Unix
4	25 (4.59%)	Windows Server 2012
5	23 (4.22%)	Windows Server 2008
6	11 (2.02%)	Windows 10
7	7 (1.28%)	Android
7	7 (1.28%)	Windows 7
8	6 (1.10%)	CatOS
9	5 (0.92%)	Windows Server 2003
10	3 (0.55%)	AIX
10	3 (0.55%)	CentOS
11	2 (0.37%)	FreeBSD
11	2 (0.37%)	Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11	2 (0.37%)	Windows 8
12	1 (0.18%)	Mac OS X
12	1 (0.18%)	VyOS
12	1 (0.18%)	Windows Phone

Processes & Methodologies
1	82 (15.05%)	Network Design
2	73 (13.39%)	ITIL
3	63 (11.56%)	Network Management
4	60 (11.01%)	Migration
5	52 (9.54%)	Load Balancing
6	41 (7.52%)	Project Management
7	32 (5.87%)	High Availability
8	27 (4.95%)	Service Management
9	26 (4.77%)	Continuous Improvement
10	25 (4.59%)	Disaster Recovery
10	25 (4.59%)	Network Monitoring
11	24 (4.40%)	Network Architecture
12	21 (3.85%)	Change Management
13	20 (3.67%)	CRM
14	19 (3.49%)	Configuration Management
14	19 (3.49%)	Incident Management
14	19 (3.49%)	Service Delivery
15	18 (3.30%)	Problem Management
16	16 (2.94%)	Integration Testing
17	15 (2.75%)	Time Management

Programming Languages
1	13 (2.39%)	SQL
2	12 (2.20%)	PowerShell
3	10 (1.83%)	C
4	8 (1.47%)	Lisp
5	5 (0.92%)	Perl
5	5 (0.92%)	Python
6	4 (0.73%)	VB
7	2 (0.37%)	Java

Qualifications
1	265 (48.62%)	Cisco Certification
2	192 (35.23%)	CCNP
3	100 (18.35%)	CCIE
4	93 (17.06%)	CCNA
5	68 (12.48%)	Security Cleared
6	48 (8.81%)	SC Cleared
7	35 (6.42%)	JNCIE
8	28 (5.14%)	CCDP
9	25 (4.59%)	Degree
10	16 (2.94%)	CCSP
10	16 (2.94%)	JNCIP
11	14 (2.57%)	CCIP
12	10 (1.83%)	Computer Science Degree
13	8 (1.47%)	CISSP
13	8 (1.47%)	JNCIA
13	8 (1.47%)	JNCIS
14	7 (1.28%)	CCIE Routing and Switching
14	7 (1.28%)	DV Cleared
15	6 (1.10%)	CCIE Service Provider
15	6 (1.10%)	Master's Degree

Quality Assurance & Compliance
1	24 (4.40%)	SLA
2	7 (1.28%)	PMO
3	5 (0.92%)	PCI DSS
3	5 (0.92%)	QA
4	3 (0.55%)	Disclosure Scotland
5	2 (0.37%)	Def Stans
5	2 (0.37%)	ISO/IEC 27001
6	1 (0.18%)	PMBOK

System Software
1	58 (10.64%)	VMware Infrastructure
2	54 (9.91%)	Active Directory
3	16 (2.94%)	Hyper-V
4	9 (1.65%)	VMware ESXi
5	8 (1.47%)	vSphere
6	7 (1.28%)	vCloud
6	7 (1.28%)	Virtual Servers
7	4 (0.73%)	Microsoft Virtual Server
8	3 (0.55%)	Docker
8	3 (0.55%)	KVM
8	3 (0.55%)	NFS
8	3 (0.55%)	Terminal Services
9	2 (0.37%)	EMC RecoverPoint
9	2 (0.37%)	Forefront TMG
9	2 (0.37%)	VirtualBox
9	2 (0.37%)	XenApp
9	2 (0.37%)	XenDesktop
10	1 (0.18%)	ProxySG
10	1 (0.18%)	VMware Server
10	1 (0.18%)	Xen

Systems Management
1	34 (6.24%)	Cisco Prime
2	33 (6.06%)	FortiGate
3	10 (1.83%)	Nagios
4	8 (1.47%)	Cisco CUCM
5	7 (1.28%)	Cisco UCCX
6	6 (1.10%)	Cacti
6	6 (1.10%)	Puppet
7	5 (0.92%)	Netcool
7	5 (0.92%)	Opscode Chef
7	5 (0.92%)	SCCM
7	5 (0.92%)	ZABBIX
8	4 (0.73%)	AirWatch
8	4 (0.73%)	NetBackup
8	4 (0.73%)	WhatsUp Gold
8	4 (0.73%)	WSUS
9	3 (0.55%)	vMotion
10	2 (0.37%)	Ansible
10	2 (0.37%)	Red Hat Satellite
10	2 (0.37%)	SCOM
10	2 (0.37%)	vRealize

Vendors
1	388 (71.19%)	Cisco
2	143 (26.24%)	Juniper
3	114 (20.92%)	F5
4	99 (18.17%)	CheckPoint
5	91 (16.70%)	VMware
6	56 (10.28%)	Fortinet
7	55 (10.09%)	Palo Alto
8	47 (8.62%)	SolarWinds
9	44 (8.07%)	Microsoft
10	43 (7.89%)	HP
11	42 (7.71%)	Citrix
12	36 (6.61%)	Avaya
13	24 (4.40%)	Riverbed
14	18 (3.30%)	Huawei
15	16 (2.94%)	Arista
15	16 (2.94%)	Aruba
15	16 (2.94%)	BT
16	13 (2.39%)	Salesforce.com
17	12 (2.20%)	Blue Coat
18	11 (2.02%)	CA