Central and North West London NHS Trust issues tender worth up to £80m

ICT services to support 5,200 end users and 5,500 staff over five year period

Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust has issued an IT services tender worth between £50m and £80m over five years.

In a notice on the Official Journal of the European Union, the trust said that it wants to appoint a new external supplier for the provision of ICT infrastructure services to support about 5,200 end users and 5,500 staff across 150 sites.

The selected supplier would have to include the transition to and provision of services such as: service desk management including disaster recovery, business continuity and security; data networks; data management; information management; end user devices; fully integrated unified communications; video conferencing; fixed and mobile telephony; printing services; application hosting; and ICT training.

"The bidder will be aware of the continuing changes that are occurring both in technology, and within the NHS at large," the tender document reads.

"The bidder must be able to flex its service arrangements to take into account these changes in technology and organisational structure that will inevitably occur during the term of the contract. With this in mind, the bidder shall be required to demonstrate that they are capable of increasing the service provision to additional users by a factor of (up to) three over the life of the contract."

The NHS trust added that it is looking for a service provider with the ability to innovate by using technology to drive continuous improvement across the trust. It said that innovation should equally apply to the financial aspects of the contract arising from procurement.

The ICT infrastructure services that cover potential clinical or information systems, business apps, and portals such as telehealth could be extended during the term of the contract, the trust said.

The contract is covered by the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA) and the deadline for interested participants is 25 March.