Accenture is bidding to take over the controversial system at the centre of the Post Office Horizon scandal.
Computer Weekly has learned that the outsourcing giant is bidding for lot two of the Post Office Horizon replacement tender. The successful bidder for the £323m contract will take over the running of the current Horizon system, when Fujitsu is finally removed next year.
The Horizon system, from Fujitsu, was introduced in thousands of Post Office branches in 1999-2000, in what was at the time the biggest non-military IT project in Europe.
Known as the “walk in and take over” contract, it includes application support, development and release management, as well as migration from the on-premise datacentre to the cloud, and the establishment of a cloud-native back-office and channel platform.
In March, Computer Weekly also revealed that IBM was bidding for the contract, with DXC partnering it.
Although the Post Office said it could not confirm Accenture is bidding, in an interview in February, the Post Office’s chief technology officer, Paul Anastassi, told Computer Weekly that all the suppliers in lot one are “high street names”, which fits the profile of US IT giants Accenture and IBM. Accenture did not comment after being contacted.
Computer Weekly understands there is one other supplier still in the running. In February, Anastassi said many suppliers bid for the lot two contract but it was “whittled down to a handful”. He said this contract is vital due to the overall Horizon estate’s complexity.
Post Office scandal
The Horizon system is at the centre of the Post Office scandal, which was first exposed by Computer Weekly in 2009, when it revealed the stories of seven subpostmasters and the problems they suffered due to Horizon, which led to the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British history (see below timeline of Computer Weekly articles about the scandal since 2009).
Lot one of the Horizon replacement tender, worth £160m, seeks a supplier to provide an off-the-shelf electronic point of sale (EPOS) system to replace the Horizon front end. A dozen suppliers bid for this £169m contract, but only three made the shortlist.
Among them is also a familiar face. As revealed by Computer Weekly in July last year, EPOS software maker Escher, which supplied middleware in the Post Office Horizon system, was eyeing lot two.
One of the criteria for suppliers, all very aware of the Horizon troubles, was a desire to make things right at the Post Office.
In a recent interview with Computer Weekly, Anastassi told Computer Weekly that Fujitsu will be out eight to 12 months after both contracts are signed with suppliers this summer. He added that by 2030, “we will have eradicated what we now know as Horizon completely from our estate. It won’t be there at all.”
He said there will be no trace of Horizon, which has more than 80 components, by 2030.
In February, the UK government announced it will provide £483m in funding towards the Post Office project to replace Fujitsu’s Horizon system and transform in-branch technology. This is in addition to funds previously provided for the project, including aborted attempts to replace Horizon, which takes the total over £700m.
