King's College Hospital's catering and soft services contract to be re-tendered

The £17m-a-year catering and soft services contract at one of London's largest teaching hospitals is to be re-tendered, Caterersearch has learnt.

King's College Hospital in Camberwell, Southwark, currently has patient and public catering, cleaning and portering services provided by Sodexo. The group has a 25% share in the hospital's 38-year private finance initiative (PFI) vehicle.

The contract has come out to open tender after the Trust carried out a benchmarking process, as demanded every seven years by PFI rules, and felt there was enough cause to warrant going down the market-test route.

The details of the tender are expected to be published on the Official Journal of the European Community this week.

The PFI came into force on 1 April 2000 and has an estimated capital value of £65m. The remaining partners are construction firms Costain and Skanska and investment firm Edison Capital.

As part of the scheme, the Golden Jubilee Wing building was built and handed over to the Trust in 2002, although Sodexo also provides services at the site's remaining legacy buildings.

Sodexo, which intends to bid, has a long-term relationship with King's College Hospital going back at least a decade to its Gardener Merchant days.

For the latest contract catering opportunities see www.caterersearch.com/tenders

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By Chris Druce

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