NHS England has extended its contract with US spy-tech biz Palantir for the system built at the height of the pandemic to give it time to resolve the twice-delayed procurement of a data platform to support health service reorganization and tackle the massive care backlog.
The contract has already been subject to the threat of a judicial review, after which NHS England – a non-departmental government body – agreed to three concessions, including the promise of public consultation before extending the contract.
Campaigners and legal groups are set to mount legal challenges around separate, but related, NHS dealing with Palantir.
In a notice published yesterday, the NHS England said the contract would be extended until September 2023 in a deal worth £11.5 million ($13.8 million).
NHS England has been conducting a £360 million ($435 million) procurement of a separate, but linked, Federated Data Platform (FDP), a deal said to be a “must-win” for Palantir, a US data management company which cut its teeth working for the CIA and controversial US immigration agency ICE.
The contract notice for FDP, which kicks off the official competition, was originally expected in June 2022 but was delayed until September 2022, when NHS England told The Register it would be published. The notice has yet to appear
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Source: Palantir’s Covid-era UK health contract extended • The Register
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