Social care IT market still evolving

Liquidlogic hopes to extend success with children's systems to the adult social care market

A key supplier of software to support the Integrated Children's System (ICS) for local authorities has seen a boom in sales as councils face a major rethink of their social care technology.

ICS is part of the government's Every Child Matters policy, designed to stop vulnerable children slipping through the social care net. But it is also contributing to changes in social care IT.

Supplier Liquidlogic has doubled its ICS customer base, adding 13 new customers and taking its market share to 20 per cent.

Turnover was up 40 per cent to £6m in the year to April 2008.

Liquidlogic said it was the first supplier to fully comply with government requirements for enhancements to ICS - many councils missed a key deadline as other suppliers failed to comply.

"We’ve had a fantastic year with the strength of our ICS product and we expect to see the same growth in integrated adult system sales this year as we have seen in children services," said Denise Harrison, sales and marketing director at Liquidlogic.

Computing recently reported that ICS has boosted competition in the social care IT market, as spending remains unchanged despite an increase in suppliers.