[Bradford] Microsoft loses NHS contract

[Alan D Barnard]

There seems a lack of any authoritative information about this. This: 
http://www.e-health-insider.com/news/6079/dh_axes_%C2%A3500m_microsoft_licensing_deal 
seems to be as good as it gets.

My take on it is that MS has supplied the software on the basis of all 
you can eat for £65,000,000 a year. Blair II has seen that the 
government has committed the NHS to £500,000,000 expenditure over 12 
years for software (I know that does not compute but the deal allowed 
for changes along the way) and that much of the software supplied is not 
actually required. Conclusion - canceling the contract produces an 
immediate saving of £500,000,000 and if any part of the NHS might happen 
to need any software then they can negotiate a deal with MS out of their 
own budget.

The reality is that the piles of 'free' software from MS is just that. 
The NHS paid MS for the software they actually needed, the rest was just 
a sweetener that cost MS nothing (in fact the costs of distributing it 
to staff for home use was paid for by the staff - thus no cost to MS and 
no cost to the NHS).

When NHS Trusts etc. try to re-negotiate the deal, they will find that 
firstly, MS has them by the short-and-curlys and secondly, MS will want 
just as much for the software without the freebies as with them.

Blair II comes up smelling of roses - £500,000,000 saved and the Trusts 
given the freedom to negotiate their own deals. The £500,000,000 will 
not of course all find its way back into the NHS coffers - he has cut 
public expenditure without being seen to cut it.

The NHS staff really will see their investment turn into a pumpkin: 
http://www.microsoft.com/uk/nhs/pages/licensing/post_ea_hup.aspx

As for FOSS, one of the readers comments says that much of the software 
used will not even work with Firefox. The time to start introducing FOSS 
was immediately after signing the deal with MS - 12 years to get MS 
free. Unfortunately putting Open Office onto those computers that do not 
really need an office suite is going to save nothing. The only thing 
that MS understands in negotiation is a big stick - and MS has one of 
their own: it is called lock-in.

The thing to remember is that the NHS is huge. At the end of the day, 
all the NHS organizations will (perhaps collectively) negotiate a deal 
with MS which won't cost so much more than they are paying now (because 
they do not have the money to pay) and the difference will be made up by 
robbing money from elsewhere. This will not make much difference because 
it will be lost in all the other 'savings' that Blair II will be imposing.

Now where are my anti-depressants?