The UK government has advertised an official contract for a federated data platform (FDP) for NHS England. The contract is valued at £360 million.
The contract has an estimated value of up to £480 million over the five-years. Tenders are invited from pre-qualified suppliers after a discussion of requirements and potential solutions.
The data platform will be owned and controlled by the NHS and will use NHS data to understand patterns, solve problems, plan services for local populations and ultimately transform the health and care of the people they serve.
The government first announced concrete plans to develop a FDP for NHS England in April 2022, when the probable cost was estimated at £220 million.
It is expected to cover:
- Population health and person insight
- Care coordination (ICS)
- Elective recovery (Trust)
- Vaccines and immunisation
- Supply chain
Procurement is expected in two lots – the platform itself plus integration services, and privacy-enhancing technology; the latter is not mentioned in the latest post.
Controversial US data mining company Palantir is likely to be a player. The company was given a £1 contract during the Covid pandemic to assist with vaccination and ventilator distribution, but its Foundry analytics platform has since found its way into multiple other parts of NHS England’s operations.
