Falcon Programme

Rating: Compared to financial year 24/25 Q4, the NISTA/SRO Delivery Confidence Assessment (DCA) rating at 25/26 Q4 improved to AMBER. This is primarily due to the following factors: - Refined Cyber Assurance and incident response mechanisms - Finalised the data migration strategy - Obtained approval for resourcing and budgets - Delivered platform go live, and pre-pilot user testing. The following area's are area's of focus to move the programme from Amber to Green: - Defining the future operating model & support processes - Improving the programme's and its partners current responsiveness to change

Schedule: Compared to financial year 24/25-Q4, the project's end-date at 25/26-Q4 has increased from Dec 2026 to Dec 2027. This is primarily due to the following factors: The platform testing in the prepilot, along with subsequent lessons learned, involved replanning. This replanning now includes additional time for the migration to the ICS Shared Services operating model and Data migration. Migrations are by Business Unit, in tranches selected by size and complexity through to December 2027 - Close

Cost: Compared to financial year 24/25 Q4, the programme's departmentally agreed whole life cycle cost at 25/26 Q4 increased. This is primarily due to a revised business case submission for Microsoft Licencing and Copilot commitment. The programme scope now includes the inclusion of Copilot and resulted in certainty over the M365 E5 cost uplifts, This resulted in a marginal increase on the baseline cost.

Source: NISTA Major Projects Annual Report 2025-26 (data)

Rating: Compared to financial year 23/24-Q4, the Infrastructure Project Authority's Delivery Confidence Assessment rating at 24/25-Q4 remained at RED. This is primarily due to the following factors‚ The Infrastructure Project Authority's Delivery Confidence Assessment rating for 24/25-Q4 remains at RED. This is primarily due to concerns that the Programme does not have the resources to transition the Cabinet Office Business Units (BUs) to the new services within the planned time frame. The delay in the Pilot, now projected for completion by September 2025, has contributed to this assessment. An IPA Gateway took place where the Review Team expressed concerns about the pace of BU migrations and the rising costs associated with the Programme. The issues are being addressed as part of an action plan with NISTA support.

Schedule: Compared to financial year 23/24-Q4, the project's end-date at 24/25-Q4 remained at 31/03/2026. This is primarily due to the following factors‚ The programmes end date is now forecast to be complete by 31 December 2026. The initial approach was for the Cabinet Office to build its own new IT system for this change. However, after review, we found this was not the most cost-effective option. We have now approved a new plan with an extended delivery window. This involves moving our digital services to a shared government service called Integrated Corporate Services (ICS), which is managed by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ).

Cost: Compared to financial year 23/24-Q4, the project's departmentally agreed Whole Life Cost at 24/25-Q4 (measured in £m) decreased from 51 to 23. This is primarily due to the following factors‚ This is due to a revised business case submission which changed from building our own platform, to outsourcing to another government department and securing migration resource from Microsoft and partners at no investment cost.

Source: NISTA Annual Report 2024-25 (data)

Rating: Compared to financial year 22/23-Q4, Senior Responsible Owner's Delivery Confidence Assessment rating at 23/24-Q4 increased from Amber to Red. This is primarily due to the following factors. The programme is currently rated at Red as it does not have an agreed strategic direction, investment and funding available. If there continues to be misalignment between the strategic intent and funding availability then the programme will almost certainly fail to deliver the scope and benefits set out in the business case. _x000D_ _x000D_ The programme's route to Green is through the submission of a Programme Business Case (PBC) with defined options for the migration and technical delivery.

Schedule: Compared to financial year 22/23-Q4, the project's end-date at 23/24-Q4 increased from 2025-03-31 to 2026-03-31. This is primarily due to the following factors. The original profiling was delayed by 12 months due to procurement delays. The original profile was a 3 year spend profile from Apr 23 to March 26. The anticipated spend profile expects an end date of April 27, 12 months after the original baseline end date.

Cost: Compared to financial year 22/23-Q4, the project's departmental-agree Whole Life Cost at 23/24-Q4 decreased from 52m. to 51m. This is primarily due to the following factors. The Whole Life Cost 51.4 m remains within the GMPP approval. There is a slight reduction in WLC 50.6 m due to in year savings in 23/24 against budget profile. The profiling over future years will be reviewed as part of the May Programme Business Case Submission. Profiles have used business planning options for the remaining years whilst the business case preparation is ongoing.

Source: IPA Annual Report 2023-24 (data)