In releasing a new list of Cabinet Committees, the Government has announced that a new National Security Council Cyber sub-committee will be created, “to consider matters relating to cyber programmes and policy development.” The sub-committee will be chaired by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and will also have the Home Secretary, the Foreign Secretary and the Secretaries of State for Defence and Health among its membership.

Cabinet Committees are groups of ministers that can take collective decisions that are binding across government. They are designed to reduce the burden on Cabinet by enabling collective decisions to be taken by a smaller group of relevant and interested ministers.

The National Security Council is one such committee, and it deals with matters relating to National Security, Foreign Policy, and Defence. The establishment of the NSC (Cyber) sub-committee is welcome and highlights the growing importance that the Government places on cyber issues, as demonstrated by last year’s announcement of increased funding for cyber security, the creation of a new National Cyber Security Centre, the publication of the National Cyber Security Strategy (expected later this year), and the decision to include cyber-crime statistics in crime figures.

{bio}henry.rex@techuk.org{/bio}

The European Commission's GROWTH service has published a request for responses regarding future Space Strategy.

GROWTH is seeking public consultation to obtain stakeholder views on policy priorties, challenges and opportunities.

Who should respond?

• Public authorities;
• Industry, including small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs);
• Research organisations and academia;User communities;
• Experts;
• Interested citizens who would like to share their views on the future space strategy.

For further information, see the original release from GROWTH.

Submissions close 12 July 2016.

The Science and Technology Committee (Lords) have published their latest report regarding EU membership and UK science.

The report covers topics of EU funding, the freedom of movement of researchers, and the ability to collaborate on major projects.

Evidence that formed the basis of this report can be read here.

For the full report, please see EU membership and UK science.

Public Administration & Constitutional Affairs Committee to review work of the Civil Service

Yesterday, the Public Administration & Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) announced a new inquiry to review the effectiveness of the Civil Service.

This new, wide-ranging inquiry will look at how the Government can continue its drive to make the Civil Service more economic and faster in delivering services to the public. Specifically, the PACAC hearing will explore the following topics:

· The structure and organisation of the Civil Service, and how appropriate this is for the 21st Century;

· The effectiveness of the Civil Service in delivering Government policy, and how well it learns from success and from failure;

· The Civil Service’s collective capabilities and civil servants’ individual skills;

· Risks to Civil Service impartiality.

techUK has worked with Government to address a number of these points, especially those relating to the Civil Service’s skills and capability and its ability to learn the lessons of programme failure.

We recently held a senior roundtable with the National Audit Office on what the Government can learn from recent IT project failures, and we will be carrying out further work around this topic later this year.

Addressing the digital skills shortage is a key focus for techUK, both in the public sector and beyond. Last year, in a survey of nearly 1,000 civil servants, having access to the right skills internally emerged as the key factor for driving better value from Government’s IT spend. This survey informed our Top Four Priorities for Delivering Better Services Through Tech, which, amongst other things, called on Government to develop better skills internally.

Welcoming this new inquiry, Naureen Khan, Associate Director for Public Sector, said,

“Given the impact that tech has across Government, especially in the delivery of public services and cost savings, it is important to review how well the Civil Service is equipped for adopting innovation and change."

“We therefore welcome the PACAC’s inquiry, which we hope will shed light on the key areas that the Civil Service must prioritise for providing better services to citizens.”

techUK looks forward to working with the Committee on this important enquiry.

{bio}conor.murray@techuk.org{/bio}

As spectrum access is important to the nine categories of the UK's national infrastructure (e.g. emergency services, energy, health etc), the workshop will ask the question “Do users understand their spectrum access risk" and "Is spectrum access, therefore, a UK critical dependency and a resilience issue?” If so, are there spectrum policy initiatives that must be considered.

This workshop aimed to:

• Capture key potential spectrum access risks, (and any examples the attendees have)
• Describing what the impacts may be – loss of revenue, transport delays, H&S impacts
• Predict if the problem will get worse in the future
• Suggest policy initiatives to mitigate the issue.

The presentations are available to download at the end of the page. 

Agenda

Introduction and overview of the focus of the workshop
Dr. Anil Shukla, Head - RF Operational Environments, QinetiQ, and UK SPF Steering Board member

New regulations for controlling interference from apparatus
Andrew Cutting, Spectrum Policy Advisor, Spectrum Group, Ofcom

Sector Perspectives

Space Sector
Mike Willis, Head of Spectrum Policy, UK Space Agency

Utilities Sector
Adrian Grilli, Managing Director, JRC

CNI Reliance on GNSS - A Serious Vulnerability
Charles Curry, Managing Director, Chronos Technology Ltd

Val Lynch, Chief Executive Officer, AND Technology Research

Cybersecurity
Jim Norton, Chair, Royal Academy of Engineering Digital Systems Engineering Community of Practice

Potential Mitigation Techniques and initiatives
Paul Howland, Principal Scientist, EM Spectrum and RF Cyber, Cyber and Information Systems Division, DSTL

Open Discussion

Close and review of feedback to UK SPF Steering Board
Dr. Anil Shukla

For further information regarding this workshop of the UK Spectrum Policy Forum please contact Skye MacLeod: 

Today, 240 companies have been recognised in the 50th Queen's Awards for Enterprise. Amongst those honoured are a number of techUK members, including Darktrace Limited, MASS, PCA Predict, TestPlant Ltd and Unilink Technology Services Ltd.

The Queen’s Awards for Enterprise are awarded to businesses for outstanding achievement in International Trade, Innovation and Sustainable Development. The Award for Enterprise Promotion (QAEP) is given to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to promoting and enhancing enterprise among UK entrepreneurs and companies.

New research from the CBI and IBM, out today, found that a digital divide is opening up across the British economy, with just over half (55%) of “pioneer” firms adopting digital technologies and processes, while the other half (45%) are falling behind.

Commenting on the findings, Antony Walker, deputy CEO of techUK, said:

"These stark findings highlight that to be a world leading digital economy we not only need a thriving tech industry, but also widespread adoption of digital technologies across all sectors. If we can increase adoption rates of the 45% of businesses that are the start of their digital journey, we can drive their productivity and growth across the whole of the UK.”

More detail on the importance of digital transformation for all businesses in the UK can be found in techUK’s input for the Government’s forthcoming Digital Strategy.

For media enquiries, contact Lucie Smith

{bio}lucie.smith@techuk.org{/bio}

During his visit to the UK to meet with his advisory board, Professor Robert Wachter – who is leading his eponymous Review into IT in the NHS – met with techUK and the Chair and Vice-Chairs of our Health and Social Care Council.

In a wide-ranging and informative meeting, Prof. Wachter reflected on some of the discussions had on his trip. As part of the discussion it was acknowledged that a number of underlying challenges face the NHS and the wider health and care sector in delivering on the government’s digital strategy in England.

Our conversation particularly focussed on procurement strategy and investment, culture – including the capacity and capability within the health service – and interoperability.

Following the meeting we were invited to put forward some more detailed analysis and recommendations relating to these issues, to help provide greater UK market supplier insight into the key areas the government review will consider.

A short paper was compiled by the techUK Health and Social Care Council and submitted to Wachter and his team: if you would like to read our submission, or have any further comments on the Wachter Review, then please do drop me a line.

We look forward to the findings of the Review when they are published, and have urged ongoing consultation and engagement with industry throughout the Review period and beyond. UK suppliers are key to delivering on NHS England’s evolving vision and plans, and techUK will continue to work to influence policy on their behalf.

{bio}felicity.cooke@techuk.org{/bio}

CESG, the information security arm of GCHQ, runs certification schemes to give customers confidence in the advice, products and services they use from industry. CESG uses its technical expertise and unique insight into the cyber threat to set the standards for the schemes and only awards its certification mark to products, services and people which meet these standards.

CESG is reviewing its certification schemes to decide on their future development in the environment of the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC). The review is actively engaging existing users of the schemes through a series of workshops, and wants to engage techUK members - both the cyber security industry and their industry customers - to actively take their views into account.

The workshop will use the open space technique in which participants set the agenda and discuss the issues of most importance to them: come to the workshop prepared to raise and speak out about the issues you care about. 

Further details about the review can be found here

Please book on the event using the link below.  

{bio}talal.rajab@techuk.org{/bio}

You may be aware that data centres have to comply with some very onerous permitting requirements due to their generating capacity, despite the fact that emissions are negligible. Some of these permits relate to air quality (eg EPR/IED and soon MCPD) and some to carbon emissions (eg EU ETS). Larger sites will be captured under multiple permitting regimes. Most of these permits are issued and enforced by the Environment Agency (EA).

We are working with the EA to help clarify the different requirements for data centre operators, which can be confusing (as you may have seen in our Compliance Roadmap, AKA Cones of Pain). However, because of the unusual characteristics of data centre generating capacity, there is scope for useful work in this area:

Firstly the EA think, and we agree, that it would be constructive to develop Best Available Techniques (BAT) specific to data centres to clarify the process for both operators and regulators when permitting these sites.

Secondly, there may be scope for developing simplified or fast track, and less expensive, permitting routines for data centres where the generating capacity is purely for emergency use. The obvious corollary to this is that for sites engaging in demand side response (DSR) the process of getting a permit is likely to remain onerous.

Thirdly, because of this impact, we need to ensure that operators are making informed decisions about DSR. So we will need to clarify the way that these instruments are likely to interact.

The objectives of this session will be to help the Environment Agency regulators understand the technical characteristics of generating plant used by data centre operators, identify common approaches, tease out the kind of pitfalls that might limit what we can achieve and in the light of this, set the scope for the three activities listed above.

If you would like to attend, please get in touch with me. The meeting will be in central London and will either be hosted by the Environment Agency or by techUK, depending on logistics. We will have a working lunch and will aim to finish before 4pm. I will circulate a more detailed agenda shortly.

NB: We will need to limit numbers so operators of larger sites and operators engaged in DSR will be given priority.

If you would like to register, please contact Emma Fryer.

techUK is holding the first meeting of a working group to discuss the development of a set of cloud data portability and system interoperability principles that can provide a strong coherent UK voice to discussions on the approach needed to balance interoperability and portability in the cloud ecosystem with innovation and competition.

This follows the publication of techUK’s Cloud 2020 Vision paper which identified enabling data portability and system interoperability within the cloud computing ecosystem as a key issue to keeping the UK at the forefront of cloud adoption.

As the Cloud 2020 paper highlights the UK has a thriving and competitive cloud computing market with many cloud providers offering innovative services at the infrastructure, platform and software level. The range and choice of cloud providers and services is continuing to increase which is good news for customers, whether they are government departments, businesses or consumers, as they benefit lower costs and rapid innovation. However, for a competitive market to work, customers need to be able to switch between providers as their needs and requirements change or as new more compelling services come to market. For that to happen services need to be interoperable so that data sets can flow between cloud providers. Cloud applications and platforms need to work seamlessly together and integrate easily with existing cloud and legal IT systems.

With the European Commission expected to explore interoperability issues as part of the European Digital Single Market strategy, techUK believe now is the time for the cloud computing market to consider what needs to happen, and perhaps what needs to change, to finally realise data portability and system interoperability within the cloud computing ecosystem.

The Cloud portability and interoperability Working Group will meet once a quarter to develop a set of principles that can be the UK voice to European and international these discussions.

An agenda for members to read ahead of the meeting will follow.

Please register via 'book now' button. To join the meeting remotely, please contact Lucas Banach.

Date: Thursday, 21 April 2016

Venue: techUK, 10 St Bride St, London EC4A 4AD

Chair: David Meyer

Presentations from the UK Spectrum Policy Forum Plenary meeting held on Thursday, 21 April 2016.

(Presentations are embedded to allow better access via mobile and tablet, they can also be downloaded at the bottom of the page.)

Agenda:

• Welcome and Introductions - David Meyer, Chair, UK Spectrum Policy Forum

• Updates from the UK Spectrum Policy forum steering board - Chris Cheeseman, Spectrum Strategy Director, BT Group and Steering Board Chairman

• Update from Cluster 1 - Janette Stewart, Principal, Analysys Mason and Chair of UK SPF Cluster 1

• Update from Cluster 2/3 - Peter Curnow-Ford, CEO, Viatec and Co-Chair of UK SPF Cluster 2

• Update from Cluster 4 - Simon Pike, Chair, UK SPF Cluster 4  

• Public Sector Spectrum Release Program - Paul Norris, Executive Director, Shareholder Executive (ShEx) and Andy Hudson, Director of Spectrum Policy, Ofcom

There was no presentation to share. Attendees received a printed copy of 'Enabling UK growth: Public Sector Spectrum Release Programme annual report'. The Central Management Unit’s strategic plan for delivering against the government’s new spectrum release target, set at the 2016 Budget and Ofcom's advice to the government on a revised spectrum release target is now available online here.

• Socioeconomic impact of 5G in Europe - Saul Friedner, Principle Consultant, Real Wireless

• In conversation with Jane Humphreys: Mark Swarbrick, Policy Head, Telecoms Market and Regulation, DCMS - Jane Humphreys, Senior Spectrum Advisor, techUK

• AOB and close - David Meyer, Chair, UK Spectrum Policy Forum

• Reception and networking in the members area

For further information about the UK Spectrum Policy Forum please contact:

{bio}zahid.ghadialy@techuk.org{/bio}

{bio}skye.macleod@techuk.org{/bio}

The restriction, which has been drafted by European Chemicals Agenc (ECHA) with the Danish authorities, covers the use of four common phthalates – DEHP, DIBP, DBP and BBP - in products that are used or stored indoors where people are present and potentially exposed to the chemicals through inhalation or via skin contact.

The draft Annex XV dossier targets products with concentrations equally to, or over, 0.1% by weight of the plasticised material, either in a concentration, individually or in combination, will be affected.

The chemicals are widely used in wires and cables to make plastic casing flexible. They can also be found in a range of products moulded from or coated with plastics, office equipment. Other uses include flooring, coating fabrics and paper, recreational gear and equipment, mattresses and footware.

The four phthalates are classified as substances of very high concern, toxic to reproduction, category 1B. They are commonly referred to as endocrine disruptors and have been found to cause male infertility and genital birth defects. They are currently subject to Authorisation under REACH, which means that companies in Europe cannot use them unless they can demonstrate that the socio-economic benefits outweigh the risks to human health and the environment. But Authorisation, unlike restriction, does not apply to imported goods.

Under the proposal the restriction would not apply to those products already placed on the market and there would be a three-year transitional period. The restriction does not cover products that are only used by industrial or agricultural workers.

The dossier follows an ECHA assessment on the use of substances on the Authorisation list in articles. It concluded that Authorisation alone does not adequately control the risks from the chemicals and that technically feasible alternatives with lower risk are available at a similar price. It concluded that the restriction would cost €16.9m per year but would save at least €32.2m in reduced social damage.

In an unusual move, the restriction dossier has been published ahead of its conformity check “for transparency purposes.” A full consultation is expected to commence this summer. A final decision will then be taken by the European Commission whether to introduce legislation to restrict the substances’ use.

{bio}susanne.baker@techuk.org{/bio}

While the cost savings and operational efficiencies offered by the cloud are very clear, unfortunately businesses are still holding back from harnessing these benefits due to concerns about the security of cloud computing services.

Despite many years of awareness raising efforts, aimed at highlighting the security benefits of the cloud and increase cloud confidence concerns, continue to prevail holding back cloud adoption, innovation, competitiveness and economic growth.

While long-standing concerns such as the risk of data breaches, data loss and denial of service attack remain it seems that concerns over the security and resilience of cloud computing services are evolving as the cloud computing market continues to develop and mature. For example new concerns being raised include the weakness of APIs, risk of cloud hijacking, impact of advanced persistent threats and the implication of insufficient access management to cloud services. This raises the question of whether the cloud security messages and advice being delivered today are relevant to how cloud services have evolved and whether the awareness raising efforts today address the concerns being raised by cloud users.

Given the importance of cloud computing to the future of the UK’s digital revolution, these security concerns and misunderstandings must be addressed. techUK is therefore holding a half day event on 18 July to bring industry leading cloud service providers and cybersecurity professionals together to identify current, and possible future, security concerns and misconceptions that may arise from the evolution of cloud services and explore possible solutions to build greater long term trust and confidence in the cloud.

Detailed agenda and speakers to be confirmed.

Over the past year, techUK's Financial Services and Payments Programme has facilitated a host of seminars educating members and stakeholders alike on the 'technological art of the possible' surrounding the blockchain, applied to financial services and beyond.

In considering what action can be taken in order to industrialise, support blockchain technology readiness and help organisations with adoption, techUK will now convene a working group to determine activities in this space going forward, which will provide a great opportunity for members to keep abreast of market developments with like-minded industry peers.

The group follows the publication of a white paper commissioned
by the techUK Financial Services Council and produced by members Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). The paper considers industrialisation of the blockchain in financial services and what institutions can do to roadmap adoption. You can read the paper’s synopsis below.

The Industrialisation of Distributed Ledger Technology in Banking and Financial Services:

The Blockchain discussion has most definitely matured beyond the theoretical, into the Use Cases and Proof-of-Concepts (POC) stage. Many banks have experimented with the technology and tried a limited number POCs in areas such as payments, trade finance and securities settlement. But what next? Production deployment of Blockchain technology in mainstream banking is still far away with a number of key questions still clearly needing to be addressed

What are the most potentially disruptive use cases and why? What are the key business & technical considerations that need to be addressed to allow industrialisation on this technology? What is the roadmap/ next steps for a bank?

Recently there has been a considerable amount of work published on the potential associated with Blockchain and distributed ledger technologies. This paper attempts to build on the work already done and attempts to focus on aspects related to industrialisation of the technology.

The papers will start with a recap of the transformation potential of the technology and potential disruptive use cases in financial services to establish the background for the opportunity, before discussing the business and technology considerations that must be addressed before the industrialisation of distributed ledger technology. In addition the paper considers the possible next steps or the industralisation roadmap that will allow for potential wide spread adaptation of this technology.

This paper concludes by discussing the key factors to measure the success the initial implementations.

techUK will launch the paper on the 25th of May with a briefing by TCS followed by a panel made up of government and industry
representatives, in considering the findings of the report as well as the remit, purpose and objectives of the working group.

A detailed agenda will shortly follow.

Ed Vaizey, Minister of State at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills told the Commons this week that the government is to publish its White Paper on the future of the BBC next month, saying he had seen an "early draft" of the document and "we are going to publish it in May".

This White Paper will set out the future direction of the BBC during the next Charter period and will provide the first insights of the expected changes and requirements of the BBC following the consultation period of the last 6 months.

techUK look forward to digesting the detail of this report and commenting on the proposals.

For more information on techUK's work on BBC Charter renewal contact:

Paul Hide 

{bio}paul.hide@techuk.org{/bio}

Futuresource Consulting has released its latest worldwide TV market report which states that shipments of 4K Ultra High Definition (4K UHD) sets grew by almost 160% in 2015 to total 32 million units, equivalent to 14% of all sets sold. This is expected to rise to almost 140 million by 2020, by which time 4K UHD shipments will command 52% of the market. Despite this growth, total TV shipments fell by 2% during 2015.

"4K UHD and OLED are expected to grow strongly in the remainder of the decade," said David Tett, Market Analyst at Futuresource. "These technologies will help to restore value in the worldwide TV market as average selling prices are expected to increase over the next few years." OLED is forecast to account for 7% of shipments by 2020, compared to just 0.2% in 2015, as interest in this premium display technology increases.

Smart TVs continue to see strong growth in all markets with shipments growing by 11% in 2015 and more than 75% of sets are expected to feature smart connectivity by 2020. Another feature, curved screens, is still a focus for some manufacturers but the range and choice of curved sets has declined.

Overall, TV sales performance suffered during 2015 due to saturation of flat panel TV in most markets, exacerbated by exchange rate and economic difficulties in some countries, notably Russia and Brazil. Europe saw the largest decline in percentage terms, falling by more than 15%, with most countries suffering significant falls.

However, Futuresource does not expect these declines to last as 2016 is expected to see worldwide shipments grow by 2% - fuelled by emerging markets and recovery in others. "Africa, the Middle East and Asia Pacific represent opportunity for growth in the coming years with TV ownership currently being relatively low in many countries within these regions," commented Tett.

High Dynamic Range (HDR) is anticipated to be a feature in all 4K UHD sets shipped in Europe and North America by 2020 with average selling prices growing as consumers demand larger screens and sales of 4K UHD resolution sets increases.

For more information on techUK's Consumer Electronics Programme contact:

Paul Hide

{bio}paul.hide@techuk.org{/bio}

The Technology Team at UKTI Japan explores technology opportunities in the Japanese market in which UK companies have strong potential to offer business and services, and try to connect UK companies to these opportunities. Recently, Japanese companies have begun looking at the concept of ‘Open Innovation’ which has the possibility of further increasing the opportunities available.

The phrase “Open Innovation” has seen a marked increase in use amongst the Japanese media over the last two years. If the Japanese market adopts open innovation, many new business opportunities for UK companies will come about. As such, the UKTI Technology Team conducted interviews with leading Japanese electronics and ICT companies in order to research the attitude towards, and current situation of open innovation in Japan. News regarding the activities of open innovation reported by the Japanese media has also been consulted and used to provide further background.

Topics covered include:

Details of Activities
Effects of Digitalisation
Areas of Focus for Japanese Companies
Technologies of Interest
Case Studies
How Business is Done in Japan
Multipliers

A copy of this report is available to download below.

{bio}paul.hide@techuk.org{/bio}

After 12 months of hard work, the Ultra HD Forum has announced the release of the Phase A Guidelines that are aimed at commercial deployments of Live broadcast & OTT services in 2016. This is a major event for the UHD industry and these guidelines will be able to guide the choices of DVB work for its Phase 2 specification.

Active contributors to these guidelines included Dolby, DTS, Fraunhofer, TPVision, LG, Sony, Ericsson, Arris, Harmonic, DTG, SKY, DirecTV, Nagra, Sigma Designs and Broadcom.

The topics covered in the Guidelines document are complex and evolving rapidly, and as such this is a living document, which the Ultra HD Forum will continue to update. The document will be continuously updated to reflect emerging technology and standards (e.g., MPEG, ITU-R, DVB, ATSC, SMPTE, SCTE, ARIB, SARFT, etc.) as well as best practices collected by Forum members’ experiences and Forum Plugfest events. The Ultra HD Forum has already commenced work on Phase B Guidelines, which will cover technologies and methods expected in 2017 and beyond.

For more information on the detail of these guidelines contact:

info@ultrahdforum.org

For more information on techUK's work on UHD deployment and promotion contact:

Paul Hide

{bio}paul.hide@techuk.org{/bio}

Last week, we hosted a debate to discuss the findings of a recent National Audit Office (NAO) report which looked at Government’s Spending with SMEs.

For background, the Minister for the Cabinet Office, Matt Hancock, increased the target of public sector spend that should be awarded to small businesses from 25% (target set by the Coalition Government) to 33% and the target includes both direct and indirect spend). The Cabinet Office has since announced that it exceeded the original 25% target over the course of 2014-15.

The NAO report, ‘Government’s spending with small and medium-sized enterprises’, was led by Joshua Reddaway, who joined us on the day, as well as the former-SME Crown Representative, Stephen Allott, and Zoe Cunningham, Managing Director ofSoftwire.

Joshua presented the key findings of the report (download the slides here), which showed that Government spending with SMEs has definitely increased but it is hard to measure by exactly how much. Joshua was also keen to point out that many Government initiatives for helping more SMEs access the market will be coming into force this year, which should result in more procurement spend being awarded to small businesses.

Though the report does cast some doubt on whether the Government actually met its 25% target, the panel agreed that the focus should not be on the target itself but on ways for bringing more SMEs into the public sector tech market. The panel and techUK members in the room found that effective pre-procurement market engagement is a key enabler for bringing in more SMEs into the public sector supply chain, and that Government should do more to encourage better market engagement. Stephen Allott felt that more should be done to promote the best practice that already exists within the public sector, such as the market engagement work between techUK and DVLA and he argued that ‘RightSizing’ was the way forward to create a level playing field with the market.

The NAO’s report also highlighted that the barriers most commonly cited by SMEs – and echoed by government departments – have not significantly changed. This was consistent with the findings of techUK’s SME Survey, where SMEs claimed that poor procurement practices, such as onerous processes and terms and conditions, were the main barriers stopping small companies winning business from Government.

To addresses these barriers, the NAO’s report recommends that the Government takes a more targeted approach and looks for specific areas where SMEs have demonstrated value. techUK fully supports the recommendations below:

• Stops changing the basis for estimating SME spending;
• Identifies those areas of the public sector where different providers can bring the most benefits;
• Uses best practice to inform future decisions;
• Identifies where it needs to have oversight of the relationship between prime contractors and their subcontractors;
• Assesses the feasibility of an integrated cross-government procurement platform to support its commercial strategy;
• Improves the quality of data in Contracts Finder.

This is an important topic for us and for many of our members, and one that we will continue to work on with Government throughout the year. We will be running our 2016 SME in September and looking at any significant trends compared to our findings last year.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Joshua, Zoe and Stephen for joining us for this lively debate with techUK members. If you have any questions regarding our work with the DVLA, please do get in touch.

{bio}conor.murray@techuk.org{/bio}