Rich-list biotech entrepreneur got £25m PPE contract

In April, the Department for Health and Social Care awarded Excalibur Healthcare Services Limited £25m to supply and deliver N95 and KN95 masks, according to a notice published on Tenders Electronic Daily.

The firm was founded by a well known life sciences entrepreneur, Sir Christopher Evans.

It is one of the largest PPE contracts from the outbreak reported so far, according to an ongoing HSJ analysis of published notices.

The largest widely-reported deal for PPE so far is an £108 million contract between the government and small pest control firm PestFix. Campaigners with the Good Law Project have since challenged the decision to hand such a large deal to a small family-run firm with net assets of roughly £18,000. PestFix says it has delivered 67 million items of PPE so far.

Most other purchases of PPE during the virus, where details have been made available, were for much smaller values. 

The masks from the Excalibur deal were delivered to a warehouse in Daventry, Northamptonshire, operated by central procurement body NHS Supply Chain.

The contract was awarded without a prior call for competition under emergency covid-19 procurement rules, according to the tender notice.

The company told HSJ it supplied the masks after responding to the government’s urgent appeal for PPE supplies. It declined to confirm how many masks it provided under the contract. The DHSC did not provide further details of the contract and the masks when asked.

N95 and KN95 are US and Chinese standards broadly equivalent to the European FFP2 designation. But the Health and Safety Executive warned in a safety alert issued on Thursday that KN95 masks should not be used as PPE if they are not CE marked, as the N95 and KN95 standards are declared by the manufacturer without independent assurance.

The only exception is for PPE organised by the UK government on which HSE has performed quality assessments.

A spokesman for Excalibur Healthcare Services said: “As a company well known to have extensive international networks and which has sourced and provided medical supplies internationally over many years, including PPE, we were able to source and provide the required PPE specified in the contract.

“The contract was fulfilled 100 per cent and all the specified PPE was sourced overseas and delivered to the UK for use by the NHS. All products sourced and supplied met the specification and certification demanded under the terms of the contract.”

A spokeswoman for the DHSC said: ”Our priority is to protect health and social care staff, including making sure they have the equipment they need to do their job safely. In this unprecedented global pandemic we will do whatever it takes to get PPE to the frontline.

“We have now signed deals with over 150 suppliers across the world to secure more PPE, and at the same we have ramped up domestic production. The safety of frontline staff and patients is of paramount importance and all PPE must undergo vigorous checks to ensure it meets the safety and quality required.”

Excalibur Healthcare Services Limited, also known as PZT Limited, was originally formed as a subsidiary of Sir Christopher’s venture capital firm Excalibur Group in 2013. It was incorporated as a separate company, of which Sir Christopher is listed as a director, in January.

Excalibur Group has funded a number of Sir Christopher’s life sciences businesses, including stem cell firm ReNeuron. In 2013 the firm received £5m from a Welsh government fund which he also chaired. After a 27-month probe, Welsh Auditor General Huw Vaughan Thomas decided that the conflict of interest, although appropriately declared, was handled poorly by the Wales Life Science Investment Fund.

Sir Christopher is a high-profile biotech entrepreneur who was included on The Sunday Times’ Rich List in 2006. He also made headlines that year when he was arrested during the so-called “cash for honours” scandal. No charges were brought after a police probe into an alleged connection between political donations and life peerages.

Sir Christopher has previously described his “shock and dismay” over his arrest in 2006 and insisted he had made no secret of what he believed to be a “straightforward commercial loan”.