Atmosphere Agency dumps Fujitsu as Post Dwelling of commercial scandal takes its toll

The Division for Atmosphere, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has ended Fujitsu’s aim in providing a flood warning design to the UK, two months after signing an extension of as a lot as 12 months. 

The run comes with Fujitsu below high ranges of scrutiny within the UK, on account of its aim within the Post Dwelling of commercial Horizon scandal, and ends a ten-yr relationship with the Atmosphere Agency.

In December, Fujitsu was awarded an extension to the £17.5m contract, which began in 2015, for as a lot as 12 months while a long-interval of time vendor was chosen, with Fujitsu among the shortlisted bidders. The Atmosphere Agency – the portion of Defra accountable for flood indicators – has now appointed Leidos Enhancements UK to crawl the service as portion of a six-yr deal price about £24m.

Fujitsu’s loss of the contract comes after the Post Dwelling of commercial Horizon scandal hit national media headlines. When the extension was signed on the discontinue of final yr, Fujitsu’s aim within the scandal was being examined as portion of the final public inquiry, but the TV drama Mr Bates vs the Post Dwelling of commercial had not been broadcast. The nationwide furore that adopted the series ended in the Atmosphere Agency going thru questions about its alternative of vendor.

The Leidos deal includes the offer of a instrument equipment and recordsdata methods, dialog instrument, telephone and data transmission services and products, IT services and products and methods and technical consultancy services and products. The soft award scrutinize said the present design has remained largely unchanged for a few years.

“Right here’s a elaborate abilities estate, and includes telemetry methods, forecasting methods and services and products all feeding into messages being issued from the flood warning design,” it said.

Even though Fujitsu announced a discontinue in bidding for presidency contracts, as a concession amid fury over the Post Dwelling of commercial scandal after the TV drama, this doesn’t embody work with existing potentialities. Fujitsu narrate for the fresh contract as well to Accenture and IBM, which additionally lost out.

Fujitsu’s fame has taken a huge hit since the published of ITV’s drama regarding the Post Dwelling of commercial, which instructed the reports of subpostmasters who became victims of the scandal, precipitated by Fujitsu’s error-inclined Horizon instrument. The Japanese vendor’s UK operation is below intense scrutiny and there is power on it to cease bidding for all authorities contracts. It has already agreed to pay in direction of the massive prices of compensation, estimated to be well over £1bn, and announced it would discontinue bidding for presidency contracts until after the present statutory public inquiry.

But it surely is but to agree how considerable this can even pay and its self-imposed discontinue on bidding for presidency contracts has accomplished runt to quench its appetite for UK public sector work. Computer Weekly has considered leaked Fujitsu inner communications which designate the vendor is concentrated on £1.3bn in UK authorities industry within the next 12 months and has a backlog of about £650m in contracts to fulfil.

Extra inner communications considered by  Computer Weekly additionally revealed that Fujitsu is spending heavily on managing the present scandal fallout. It has sought external attend in a challenge identified as Holly, the set up it has engaged PR, moral industry experts and lawyers, at a rate of £27m up to now.

Basically based on data shared with Computer Weekly by procurement experts Tussell, Fujitsu has superb received one authorities contract up to now in 2024, down from six on the identical point final yr.

The Post Dwelling of commercial scandal was first uncovered by Computer Weekly in 2009, revealing the reports of seven subpostmasters and the complications they suffered as a outcomes of the accounting instrument (watch timeline of Computer Weekly articles regarding the scandal beneath).

Additionally read: What you need to know regarding the Horizon scandal 

Additionally scrutinize: ITV’s documentary – Mr Bates vs The Post Dwelling of commercial: The accurate story 

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