The department has revealed that a planned engagement, now expected to be worth £350m, will be comprised of two lots, focused on multidisciplinary teams as well as dedicated data experts
The Home Office has revealed details of a major planned contract intended to enable the department to bring in expert data professionals.
In a new and updated early engagement notice for the proposed Data and Analytics Services (DSA) agreement, the department also raised the ceiling for spending via the deal by £100m – to £350m.
The new notice also reveals that the DSA will be comprised of two separate contracts, each with a separate supplier that will serve as “prime delivery partners” in two defined areas.
The first of these covers “data-led multifunctional teams”, while the second is focused on “teams and/or specialist individuals within the data and data-related… profession”. The two lots are expected to be worth £200m and £150m, respectively, over the course of a four-year term expected to being in August 2025.
Both of these segments will support a wider departmental DSA team that “delivers critical matching, analytic, reporting and insight services across all areas of the Home Office and beyond”. This area is becoming a “major focus” for the department, according to the new commercial notice.
The first lot of the proposed £350m contract is intended to enable the Home Office to bring in “multi-functional integrated teams [that are] commissioned to support the transformative implementation of DSA’s emerging data strategy”.
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“This includes the ability to increasingly standardise and integrate current bespoke functionality from related programmes into DSA’s core offerings,” the notice says.
The second section will be focused entirely on data experts and will support projects where “if non-data professions are required to create a team, these to be sourced as civil servants”.
The Home Office is planning the two-track deal to replace “several major contracts” currently providing similar services – “all of whose initial term will end at the end of calendar year 2024 and into 2025”.
“It is anticipated that the extension options available under the contracts will be utilised to allow a gradual transition during 2025/26,” the notice adds.
The Home Office plans to open bidding for the contract next year, and run further competition processes in early 2025. Providers can bid for both lots, if they wish – but the department has committed to awarding the to two different firms. The chosen bidders will be appointed to initial four-year agreements due to run until August 2029 – plus a potential 12-month extension.
“The contracts are planned to provide data-related professions on a resource augmentation basis as well as data and analytics outcome-based pieces of work”, the notice says. “Whilst the majority of roles under the latter will be data and analytics related, in order to deliver outcomes, there will be provision for non-data roles – e.g. delivery, architecture, user-centred design.”
A market-engagement procedure to inform the Home Office’s plans for the deal took place over the summer. Firms potentially interested in bidding for the contract are advised that they can find details of the findings of this process at techUK’s website.
