CCS to launch £800m NHS IT framework

The Crown Commercial Service (CCS) is to establish an £800m framework for IT management services for NHS and social care.

It has issued a contract notice for the framework, seeking suppliers to provide a range of services for use by NHS Digital, as well as other public sector health and social care organisations.

The agreement will cover services for DevOps, digital definition, build and transition, end-to-end development and management, according to the notice.

“CCS intends to put in place an agreement for the provision of digital capability for health for use by NHS Digital and other public sector health and social care bodies for the provision of digital outcomes and supporting services,” the notice said.

“The agreement is being developed with NHS Digital as the operator, which requires digital capability to meet specific needs of the health and social care sector. NHS Digital requires suppliers to invest in understanding their specific organisational needs and bespoke delivery of their services to meet requirements.”

CCS envisions about 12 suppliers joining the framework, with whom NHS Digital can “develop strategic relationships over a sufficient period of time, to warrant up-front investment in framework level supplier agnostic competition, while maintaining effective and efficient competition at call-off”, the notice said.

“Building of closer strategic relationships will encourage suppliers to improve and innovate on their delivery of services.”

CCS hopes to establish the framework and award contracts by the end of January 2021, and suppliers have until 24 September 2020 to submit bids.

For end-to-end development services, suppliers must be able to “combine the full set of agile phases of discovery through to live”, and data management services are “primarily targeted at building, enhancing and maintaining data assets, migrating data from one system to another and analysis and reporting from such data assets”, the notice said.

Suppliers also have to deliver work using the Government Digital Service’s agile methodologies, and the framework is intended to address “the evolving technical ‘stacks’ associated within the different pillars of NHS Digital, which includes platforms and infrastructure, product development and data services”.