Imaging equipment for medical, dental and veterinary use

Tender description

The Christie NHS Foundation Trust (‘The Christie’) and Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (‘CMFT’) (together, ‘the Trusts’) are seeking to identify a private sector partner(s) to provide the technology needed to support its forthcoming bid for the provision of PET/CT services to NHS England. It is anticipated that a procurement process for Phase 2 PET/CT Services (National Contract 2 ‘NC2’) will be undertaken by NHS England during Quarter 1 of 2017/18. The Trusts intend to bid jointly to NHS England for the provision of these services, and are seeking expressions of interests from technology providers to participate in the bidding arrangement. The Christie NHS Foundation Trust (‘The Christie’) and Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (‘CMFT’) (together, ‘the Trusts’) are seeking to identify a private sector partner(s) to provide the technology needed to support its forthcoming bid for the provision of PET/CT services to NHS England. It is anticipated that a procurement process for Phase 2 PET/CT Services (National Contract 2 ‘NC2’) will be undertaken by NHS England during Quarter 1 of 2017/18. The Trusts intend to bid jointly to NHS England for the provision of these services, and are seeking expressions of interests from technology providers to participate in the bidding arrangement. The use of PET/CT has become the standard quality of care for optimal management of patients with certain types of cancer and cancer related indications and are likely to continue to account for 85 % — 90 % of the total requirement for PET/CT scans. The Christie is presently considered by the NHS England Commissioner as the prime vendor of FDG Oncology PET/CT procedures for Greater Manchester. The whole service is delivered in collaboration with CMFT, which is the provider for Rubidium cardiac, non-oncological and paediatric PET/CT. The current service is the largest regional networked service modelled around a ‘hub and spoke’ delivery system in England, as per the recommendation of the Royal College of Radiologists. The Trusts want to build on this success and deliver these services under the proposed NC2. At this stage, the Trusts are open to the possibility of entering into a form of partnering arrangement with the technology provider(s) for the purposes of bidding to NHS England. Participation in such a partnering arrangement may either be by direct involvement in a corporate Joint Venture with the Trusts (i.e. the establishment of a public/private Special Purpose Vehicle) or through a contractual Joint Venture. Alternatively, the Trusts may simply bid to NHS England on the basis of a sub-contracting arrangement (i.e. not involving a form of partnership), in which the chosen technology provider under this procurement exercise is identified as one of the Trusts' key sub-contractors. For the avoidance of doubt, the Trusts may consider entering into arrangements with one or more technology providers should that be considered appropriate. The technology provider will potentially be required to provide, install, and maintain some of the scanning equipment required for the purposes of delivering NC2 should the Trusts' proposal be successful in its bid to NHS England. The successful provider may also be required to operate the scanning facilities and provide other related services. There may also be a degree of construction works associated with the provision of the scanning facilities. The current intention is to utilise the dialogue phase of this procurement process to discuss and agree with each shortlisted bidder what the optimal approach to delivery of the technology and related services should be. The precise scope of all aspects of the proposed arrangements (including any partnering arrangement) will therefore be confirmed through the dialogue process. For the avoidance of doubt, it should be noted that this procurement process by the Trusts aims to identify a technology provider to join the Trusts in bidding to NHS England for the provision of PET/CT services. There is no guarantee that the Trusts' bid will be successful in their bid to NHS England and, in which case, the Trusts may determine that it is not appropriate to proceed to award the contract.