NHS England chief data officer Ming Tang is telling the Palantir critics to go forth and multiply as she has plans to push the US outfit’s kit deeper into hospitals over the next 12 months.
Tang has told colleagues that the Federated Data Platform, which consolidates patient information in one place, is delivering “outstanding results” by speeding up surgeries and getting patients home more quickly. She wants “maximum product penetration”, meaning hospitals use all the tools already sitting inside the platform.
In an internal memo seen by the FT, Tang said her team would “maintain our focus” despite rows about Palantir’s work in US defence and immigration enforcement. She flagged co-founder Alex Karp’s backing for Donald Trump without pretending it was some minor side issue.
Tang wrote: “While media and campaign groups continue to raise questions about our technology supplier, the programme is focused on the evidence: the FDP is delivering.”
Some NHS staff are refusing to work on the FDP because they do not want to be tied to Palantir. Ministers are even looking at using a break clause next year in the company’s £330mn (€380mn) contract, awarded in 2023.
UK health secretary Wes Streeting acknowledged “there’s a question people have about values”. That landed as the FDP keeps getting sold internally as a cure for waiting lists and creaking hospital admin.
In a memo sent to senior executives last week, Tang insisted the programme “is driving faster diagnosis, faster referrals, faster treatments”. She claimed more than 100,000 extra patients have had operations through more efficient use of theatres.
Tang wrote: “By staying focused on the delivery of these benefits, alongside data security, we will continue to prove the value of this programme through outstanding results,” she said.
Although Tang is due to stand down this month, she wants the programme to move “from breadth to depth” in the next year. That means less chasing sign-ups and more leaning on hospitals to share waiting lists across NHS trusts.
Shared waiting lists were pitched in Labour’s manifesto to help meet Sir Keir Starmer’s pledge for 92 per cent of routine treatment within 18 weeks by the end of the parliament. The NHS is struggling to hit that target, which makes any shiny data platform look tempting.
Tang brushed off critics who say the FDP has shown limited benefits so far, likening the first phase to “laying the foundations of a building: it has involved an immense amount of work that has often not been visible from the outside”.
She said it “gives the FDP its transformative potential” and would “enable the NHS to shift from a reactive service to a proactive, data-driven organisation”.
Tang drew heat in 2024 after agreeing to be the “guest of honour” at a dinner hosted by Global Counsel, the now-defunct lobbying firm founded by Lord Peter Mandelson. Palantir was a client, which did not exactly help the optics.
