Stale Pre-tender

Working Age Services Project Zora - Application Decomposition & Microservices Transition

Details

Buyer: Department For Work and Pensions (DWP)
Value: £34,500,000
Topic: Software programming and consultancy services
Published: 18 April 2026
Submission: 5 June 2026
Source: uk:find_a_tender

Tender description

Project Zora is a strategic programme within the Department for Work and Pensions’ Working Age Services portfolio, focused on improving the sustainability, agility and resilience of the Universal Credit service. It addresses the constraints of a long‑standing monolithic application estate to enable more responsive delivery of policy change, user needs and future service evolution. The programme will progressively decompose elements of the Universal Credit application into more modular, loosely coupled components aligned to a modern, microservices‑based architecture. This includes re‑architecting systems and supporting capabilities to reduce interdependencies, improve deployment flexibility, and enable faster, safer change while maintaining continuity of service. Through this transformation, Project Zora aims to establish reusable platform and service capabilities that can be iterated over time and support wider Working Age Services objectives. Delivery is expected to require specialist digital, engineering and delivery expertise across analysis, design, build and transition activity, with a clear focus on managing operational risk, supporting user‑centred outcomes and delivering long‑term value for money.

Timeline

Completed: Pre-tender published18 April 2026
Current notice

About the buyer

The Department For Work and Pensions (DWP) delivers the State Pension and working-age benefits to millions of claimants, and buys as a central government ministerial department with its own commercial teams. Framework agreements are called off through the Government Commercial Agency using Public Sector Contract terms. Suppliers can join its low value purchasing system freely, with no cap on numbers. Dynamic purchasing systems cover welfare-to-work and employment support opportunities.

Over the past 5 years, most of DWP's contract awards have been in education and training, IT services and business services.

Decision makers

Connect with the people behind this procurement.

Job title	Phone number	Work email
Head of Procurement	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov
Commercial Director	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov
Procurement Manager	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov
Category Lead	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov
Senior Buyer	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov
Contracts Manager	+44 •••• ••••••	••••••••@department-for-work-and-pensions-dwp.gov