Health and social care programme wrapped – 2025 in review

A look back at the priorities, partnerships and progress that shaped 2025. Highlights from a year of collaboration across health and social care.

Introduction

2025 was a year of significant system change across health and social care with major reform programmes and a growing momentum for meaningful collaboration between the public sector and industry. Against this backdrop, the Health and Social Care Programme continued to act as a trusted convenor for techUK members. As a community, we fostered a space for open, constructive dialogue with senior decision-makers and ensured industry expertise to support and inform the direction of travel for the system.

A year of impact in numbers

2025 was another busy year for the Health programme at techUK, with several milestones for our community, including:

4 Consultation Responses
6 industry days
10 roundtables and workshops
22 Industry Briefings
13 members discussions
3 flagship events

Highlights

Flagship events and report

In 2025, the programme delivered three flagship events, two industry dinners in London, Leeds and our third yearly summit. These events brought members into direct conversation with senior leaders from NHS England, government departments, regulators, and national bodies, engaging with figures such as Sir Jim Mackey, Chief Executive of NHS England, Ming Tang, Chief Data and Analytics Officer and Interim Chief Digital and Innovation Officer at NHS England, Alex Crossley, Director of Transformation Strategy, Finance, and Delivery at NHS England, Sonia Patel, Chief Informatics Officer, Samantha Roberts, Chief Executive Officer at NICE, and Samantha Jones, DHSC Permanent Secretary.

202601-HSC-Health and Social Care Programme wrapped – 2025 in review-pic1.png

On the day of the summit, the programme also launched a report co-authored with the case studies and insights from our SME members to spotlight the incredible innovation that SMEs champion and showcase the important role that they can play in delivering the ambitions of the 10-year health plan. This work reached and informed senior policy leaders and public-sector stakeholders, strengthening the visibility of member expertise at a national level.

How techUK’s SMEs can deliver the 10 Year Health Plan for England

Policy influence and industry collaboration

Our work, however, went far beyond the milestones of our major events.

Consultation responses

Over the past year, we convened members to unify their voices and provide responses to four consultations, including a response to MHRA on the post-market surveillance for medical devices, evidence to the Office of Life Sciences on Life Sciences Investment, coordinated panel discussions and insights for the 10-year health Workforce Plan, and the Care Quality Commission.

On a recurring basis, stakeholders throughout NHS England, DHSC, and OLS turned to techUK to get access to the expertise of our members, through workshops, roundtables, and the diligent work of our Council and Working Groups. Through techUK, industry leaders supported stakeholders to work through technical challenges (Genomic Medicine Interoperability team) scope best practices (NHS England data blueprint and architecture) and include industry perspective in the development of major policy developments (Life Sciences Sector Plan) and projects (Single Patients Record)

Early access to knowledge and pre-market procurement opportunities

Through the membership, members also got the opportunity to gain early access to relevant information through our yearly industry days (with NHS England Urgent & Emergency Care, NHS Genomic Medicine, NHS Product and Platforms, and NHS Frontline Digitisation), and our monthly industry briefings with CEOs and CDIOs across the health ecosystem.

Additionally, techUK's Health Programme positioned members to connect with NHS bodies to access pre-market opportunities and view leads, tenders, and partnerships. we supported NHS Blood and Transplant to develop a case management system and engaged with NHS Networks and Connectivity and Single Patient Record Programme to support their industry engagement ahead of the procurement phase.

What’s next?

This year, we are already starting full steam ahead, as we:

Are collecting members throughout January insight on the MHRA consultation on AI regulation;
Are in line to kick off engagements with the NHS on the single patient's record and the tech data blueprint.
Our meeting with OLS to engage on the second pillar of the Life Sciences Sector Plan regarding SME support, implementation pathways and ecosystems needs.

Join us!

We invite all members to engage with us more closely in the coming year, as 2026 promises to be a year of major change and growing momentum.

If you are a techUK member and want to understand how to best engage with our programme, we invite you to join us on our quarterly Maximising Membership Sessions (Q1 session scheduled on 5 February, register here).

If you are not yet a member of techUK and are interested in learning more about the programme and how to take part in our opportunities, please contact our Head of Programme, Robert Walker ([email protected]).

Viola Pastorino

Junior Programme Manager, Health and Care Team, techUK

Viola Pastorino is a policy, governance, and strategic communication specialist.

She joined techUK as the Junior Programme Manager in the Health and Care Team in April 2024.

She has obtained a Bachelor of Sciences in Governance, Economics, and Development from Leiden University, and a Master's programme in Strategic Communications at King's College London. Her academic background, leading up to a dissertation on AI policy influence and hands-on campaign development, is complemented by practical experience in international PR and grassroots project management.

She is skilled in qualitative and quantitative analysis and comfortable communicating findings to varying stakeholders. Above all, she is deeply passionate about the intersection of technology and government, especially how technology and global discourse shape one another, the processes that lead to belief polarisation and radicalisation of communities, and crafting strategic narratives that steer public discourse.

Outside of work she loves reading, live music light operation, and diving.

Read lessmore

Health and Social Care Programme activities

techUK is helping its members navigate the complex space of digital health in the UK to ensure our NHS and social care sector is prepared for the challenges of the future. We help validate new ideas and build impactful strategies, ultimately ensuring that members are market-ready. Visit the programme page here.