UK Favorted U.S. Spy Firm Palantir For NHS Deal

US spy-tech firm Palantir was a shoo-in for a multi-million-pound NHS contract months before the deal was signed, emails obtained by openDemocracy appear to show, Lucas Amin reported.

The firm, owned by billionaire Donald Trump donor Peter Thiel, has won five NHS deals in a row without tender. I Photo: Rathfelder Wiki Commons

The email exchange from 2020, in which senior NHS executives discussed the budget for a new national data platform, sees more than one person referring to Palantir as the recipient of the funding.

The firm, owned by billionaire Donald Trump donor Peter Thiel, has won five NHS deals in a row without tender. It is heavily tipped to secure a separate contract worth £480 million later this year to build a new “operating system” for the NHS.

Conservative MP David Davis told openDemocracy it was “incredibly concerning that the NHS appears to have already taken decisions to award contracts to Palantir before the end of the procurement process.”

He added: “Allowing a company with Palantir’s provenance into the NHS needs careful scrutiny. It must not be railroaded through in secrecy.” Palantir officially signed a £23.5m deal on December 11, 2020, to operate a full-scale “datastore” of NHS patient information, building on work carried out during the pandemic.

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