NHS Improvement Data & Analytics Platform; Operations, Enhancement and Development.

Tender description

Why the Work is Being Done Information and analytics are critical in delivering the NHS Long-Term Plan. Staff within NHS Improvement and the wider health and care service require relevant, timely, robust and accessible insight to drive decision-making, improvement and strategy development. The analytical insights must be data-driven and locally, regionally and nationally actionable, with best practice and support to assist end-users. NHS Improvement delivers essential, data driven programmes that cover, as examples, performance and quality, finance and costing, benchmarking and population health. These will come together with NHS England analysis and be supported by the existing data and development platforms as they evolve. Problem to Be Solved It is essential that NHS Improvement’s platform is suitably supported in its operations and in response to the continued development of analysis, products and services. This opportunity is to run, support and improve the range of components that comprise the platform, including the data, using agile methodologies and continuous integration and delivery. NHS Improvement requires a supplier that can offer key skills to deliver operational outcomes in conjunction with internal staff and other suppliers working to develop products and deliver analytics. NHS Improvement requires highly competent, specialised resources to rapidly and continuously run, support, improve and automate the platform. Who Are the Users As Senior Responsible Officer (SRO), I need highly competent teams to run, automate and enhance the data and development platform/framework, improving its performance, security, resilience and scalability. I need a reliable partner to provide responsive operational support to deliver common capabilities and common data that underpin analytics and strategic initiatives such as GIRFT, A&E reporting, Financial Monitoring and Patient Level Costing. I need a flexible resource offering to enable scalable operations and platform change to enable a roadmap of products to deliver measurable business benefit at pace whilst continuously improving. Early Market Engagement A Market Alert Notice was emailed to all suppliers registered on DOS3 Outcomes. A Suppliers' Briefing Teleconference is scheduled for Wednesday 24 April, 15:30. Details on how to register your interest in attending is provided in the Market Alert and on this portal (log in required). Work Already Done The data and development platform is a live service of components underpinning several verticals such as Model Hospital, Provider Finance Monitoring, GIRFT and A&E Dashboard. The core infrastructure is on-premise with varying degrees of automation and use of cloud technologies. The platform comprises the Microsoft Analytics Platform System, utilities such as Alteryx & Tableau, SAML based identity management, Microsoft Azure components (DW, Cosmos DB, APIM & Data Factory), BIML MIST, .NET applications and Python/Django CMS. The platform is expected to evolve as it is integrated with NHS England data services and will adopt further Cloud architecture and Robotic Process Automation. Existing Team Product and operations teams in NHSI are comprised of both permanent employees and supplier staff. NHSI has approximately 60 internal technical staff working to deliver and support data drive products and analytics. At any one time, there are an approximately similar number of supplier-based staff working on projects across 3-5 key suppliers. As the supplier working to support, maintain and improve the core framework the operational support partner would be expected to work in rainbow teams will all other suppliers and internal staff. Teams are cross-functional and blended, enabling agile product development and knowledge-sharing while minimising single points of failure. Current Phase Live Work Location The customer is central London based and there is a requirement to work on site. Aspects of the work may also be delivered in Leeds. NHSI requires a supplier who can provide a high quality and cost-effective delivery model. Such a model may include a blend of off shore resources in addition to the onsite presence (to ensure strong business understanding of critical services and effective engagement). Working Arrangments Continuous improvement and agility through the application of agile tools and techniques in an environment where Quality Assurance is embedded in all processes from requirements gathering to development and delivery. Team members will be expected to work with and play a key role in implementing continuous integration and delivery pipelines and automate the repetitive operations of data ingestion, testing, management and monitoring. The supplier must ordinarily operate with agile business analysis and QA through the application of techniques such as BDD. Agile ceremonies and processes will be adhered to and continuously improved through retrospectives. See Cultural Fit also. Security Clearance Clearance is not required. Supplier should have a satisfactory clearance (Level 2+) against NHS IG Toolkit, and be ICO registered. Supplier resources are required to complete NHS Improvement IG training to a satisfactory standard and may need to sign specific DSA/NDA. IS027001 & experience of handling sensitive data is desirable. Additional T&Cs All IPR will be retained by NHS Improvement. No license or permission to use the artefacts delivered by the Supplier is granted except insofar as to deliver the requirements of this Agreement. The successful Supplier is required to enable effective transition from the existing service. This transition period is anticipated to be approximately 3 months. Skills & Experience Demonstrate a minimum of 3 years experience managing and developing on Microsoft APS platform and associated SQL Server development in production setting (including security, role-based access, TSQL & SSIS. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years experience in Azure development and support for data platform and web services. Additional Information for above: Data components/pipeline (CosmosDB, AzureDW, Alteryx, Blob Storage, IOTEvent Hub, data factory): Web Services (Web & logic apps, API Manager, Azure Functions): Azure infrastructure services (Traffic manager). Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years experience supporting, extending and developing digital applications utilising the following components: Okta identity and access management; Single Page Applications and; Open source CMS wagtail. Additional Information for above; Okta identity and access management (open ID connect, SAML2): Single Page Applications (AngularJS & ReactJS), .Net Core, .Net API: Open source CMS wagtail (Python and Django). Demonstrate significant experience in supporting live services to agreed SLAs (including service credit regime), with appropriate monitoring, reporting, and proactive management for continuously improving core platforms. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years supporting automation of quality assurance in a CI/CD and devOps model using the following tools: Azure DevOps CI/CD, Powershell, ARM Templates, Selenium, JMeter. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years managing data warehouses hosting NHS datasets with demonstrable experience in understanding the content and governance requirements of NHS data. Demonstrate significant experience in architecting, managing and optimising data loaded into a Data Vault architecture. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years experience in using BIML frameworks in a production setting. Demonstrate significant experience managing BI visualization tools e.g. Tableau. Demonstrable mature Offshore/Nearshore capability at scale as part of a standard offering. Demonstrable the ability to offer extended support (7 days a week) and 24 hour for key initiatives. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years experience of of SharePoint development and administration. Demonstrate a minimum of 2 years experience of VBA development on the Microsoft Office stack, in particular Excel. Nice to Haves The product roadmap will necessitate support and maintenance of new systems which MAY include; Enterprise application visualisation and management tool(s); Data Virtualisation Platform(s). Summarise your experience. Also, the product roadmap is LIKELY to include; Azure Data Bricks/similar; Data science platforms/systems e.g. Azure ML & R; Big Data platforms/services; Data process automation tool(s). Summarise your experience. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria Demonstration of depth of understanding of our platform operations requirement. (20 points). Demonstration of depth of understanding of our platform enhancement and development requirements. (10 points). Detail you proposed technical solution for our platform operations requirement. (40 points). Detail you proposed technical solution for our platform enhancement and development requirement. (20 points). Detail you approach and methodology to delivery for our platform operations requirement. (40 points). Detail you approach and methodology to delivery for our platform enhancement and development requirement. (20 points). Provide your team details including roles, key personnel and example CVs of proposed resources for our platform operations requirement. (40 points). Provide your team details including roles, key personnel and example CVs of proposed resources for our enhancement and development requirement. (20 points). For our platform operations requirement, identify risks and dependencies and proposed mitigations to manage them. (20 points). For our platform enhancement and development requirement, identify risks and dependencies and proposed mitigations to manage them. (10 points). Provide your high-level transition approach from the current service to the new service. Including timescales and key milestones. (30 points). When responding to the Proposal Criteria, shortlisted suppliers must address the technical requirements and other relevent information provided throughout this notice and within supporting materials / Q&A (N/A Points). Cultural Fit Criteria Work in rainbow teams supporting product development initiatives and integration work alongside other suppliers. Manage delivery in an Agile environment (using DevOps and Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment approaches). Commercial and legal governance must support agile delivery. Share knowledge, experience and skills with other team members so as to build sustainable capability. Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method Written proposal Case study Work history Reference Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 50% Cultural fit 10% Price 40% Questions from Suppliers Budget range up to £2,900,000 inclusive of expenses and excluding vat. the business case for this requirement is approved.