Palantir's £330m NHS contract can be cancelled in February.
The break clause in Palantir's seven-year Federated Data Platform contract with the NHS becomes available in February, The Register reported.
The £330 million contract links data sources to help the health service work through its elective care backlog.
Zubir Ahmed, a junior minister at the Department of Health and Social Care, said: "My north star is always patient safety and quality, and of course value for money. If, at the point of the break clause, we evaluate and find that there are other providers that can do the job better, then of course that needs to be looked at and reflected upon."
The Register reports Palantir's earlier UK health work included about £60 million of pandemic-era contracts awarded without competition. The company has also hired a former deputy leader of the Labour party as its UK senior vice president.
A break right is only useful if the evidence is ready. That takes an auditable performance record against agreed baselines. The transition plan needs to be costed too.
For the contracts in your estate that carry break rights, who owns that performance record and the exit cost model?
Sources
Our file on Palantir
- 15 Sept
Nvidia limited Anthropic's models to less sensitive work. Palantir asked for written guarantees.
For your next steering committee
- 1Ask which exit clauses your largest software and services contracts carry, and when each can be used.
- 2Ask what leaving would cost, in money and in months.
- 3Ask who reads the contract when a dispute starts, and whether they have read it before.
Issue 01 of the ERP LEADERS brief puts a timeline, the three-number review and six questions on one page. Read issue 01
Welcome back. · Issue 01