Health tech in the Nordics rarely makes the news, except for Kry and Nokia. Tunstall has made news, but of the troublesome sort. Adda Inköpscentral, the strategic supply consultant which manages the Swedish framework agreement for procurement of telehealth alarms, is excluding Tunstall as a supplier in two ongoing procurements for security alarms and security-creating technology. The framework agreements are Security Alarms and Alarm Reception 2019 and a corresponding agreement, Security-creating Technology 2018. Adda has reached out to competitive companies for future contracts under these two agreements, which are winding up.

Worse, Adda is excluding Tunstall as a supplier for the new security alarms four-year framework agreement. The decisions are based on their investigation, concluding that Tunstall “violated the previous framework agreement in several respects”. “Our decision to exclude Tunstall from future framework agreements is based on our assessment that the company cannot live up to our high demands as a framework agreement supplier.” (Google translation)  Adda’s notice on Tunstall exclusion

The reasons why date back to October and multiple incidents in alarm responses. Adda’s investigation, which wrapped in late April, cited failures such as long response times in alarm response. SVT Nyheter used more dramatic language. “Thousands of old and sick were affected when the alarms stopped working in over a hundred municipalities. In Luleå, a woman who sounded the alarm died in vain (sic) several times.” Apparently, a software update went bad, disabling the alarms, but SVT‘s reporting has covered other incidents.

According to SVT, Adda currently manages procurement agreements for 200 municipalities. In Sweden, municipalities are free to negotiate their own contracts. If they choose to work under the framework, the municipalities create their own detailed contracts using the framework as a basis. Contracts signed under the old agreement remain in effect. 

Tunstall has commented that “they are disappointed with the message, do not agree with the criticism and are now analyzing the decision to decide whether to appeal it.” Additionally, they commented to SVT that “they had handed over an action plan and hoped to be able to sign the agreement in the near future.” Tunstall’s Swedish HQ is in Malmö and their security center in Örebro. Hat tip to an anonymous Reader 

Editor’s note: Editor Donna invites Tunstall to reach out to me for comments or updates.