The Home Office has increased the projected value of its next passport production contract by £216 million, taking the total to £576 million including VAT and stretching the deal from ten years to 12.
Contract value and timeline: bigger and later
The department’s procurement notice issued on 24 April raises the estimated total value for the Provision of Passport Manufacturing and Personalisation Services from £360 million over 10 years (previously cited as £36 million a year) to £576 million over 12 years (£48 million a year). The published start date for the contract has been moved from September 2027 to August 2028, and the planned publication of the full tender notice has been postponed from June to November of this year. The notice also describes this as the Home Office’s third round of engagement with suppliers.
Passport volumes and the unexplained uplift
The latest version of the notice states HM Passport Office issues about eight million passports annually, an increase from seven million cited in the first notice. The Home Office itself notes the higher passport volume would not fully account for the increased annual contract value.
How the new contract differs from the current Thales deal
The Home Office’s existing passport production contract, which began in April 2018 with Thales (the buyer of the original winning bidder Gemalto), carried an estimated value of £262 million over 11.5 years — about £22.8 million a year — and is scheduled to end on 30 September 2029. The new procurement timeline and pricing parameters published in April 2026 therefore reflect a materially higher annual spend and a longer overall term than the current arrangement.
Scope: personalization, biometrics, digital credentials and crypto provision
Beyond physical production of passports and other travel documents, the forthcoming supplier will be required to personalise documents with data including biometrics. The notice also sets out requirements for production of digital travel credentials and for making provision “for crypto technologies and contingency solutions.” Potential suppliers will be given the opportunity to ask questions after completing a non-disclosure agreement at an online event scheduled for 18 May.
IBM software contract and the Home Office’s procurement rationale
Separately, the Home Office disclosed it will pay IBM £5.88 million including VAT for software licenses and support services to operate and maintain its biometric systems between 1 May 2026 and 30 April 2028. The department is awarding that contract directly without competition, explaining that the software and support services are “proprietary to IBM and embedded within existing live systems, with no reasonable alternative supplier without disproportionate technical difficulties.”
What this means for technologists, procurement leaders, and passport holders
- Technologists and security teams: will need to assess requirements tied to biometric personalisation, digital travel credentials and the stated provision for crypto technologies and contingency solutions when engaging with the tender or integrating with current systems.
- Procurement leaders and potential suppliers: face a later tender publication (now November) and an online Q&A event on 18 May conditioned on signing an NDA; they must factor the larger annual value and longer term into commercial and delivery plans.
- Passport holders and the travelling public: the Home Office’s own figures show issuance at about eight million passports a year, and the procurement changes could affect how passports are produced and personalised going forward.
The record published on 24 April makes clear the Home Office is recalibrating both scale and schedule for its next passport production contract while locking in short-term software support from IBM. Suppliers have a narrow window to engage under NDA at the mid-May event, and the full tender will not be published until November — leaving a defined window in which the department’s revised assumptions and increased annual budget will be tested by the market.
