Block is thrilled to announce that we have been named a finalist in two categories at the prestigious Health Tech Awards 2025 – Major Project Go Live and Best Use of Digital and Data for NHS Trusts. These nominations recognise the exceptional teamwork, collaboration, and commitment to improving experiences that runs through everything we do.
Major Project Go Live: Barts Unified Communications
Our shortlisted entry, Unifying Critical Communications at Barts Health NHS Trust, highlights the scale and impact of our work to deploy a unified communications solution across five major London hospitals.
This complex project involved untangling 10 legacy telephony systems, auditing 14,000 devices, and delivering a phased cloud migration with zero downtime, all while ensuring that critical calls, including emergency “2222” resus calls, were never disrupted.
Today, Barts is benefiting from:
- 33.6 million calls successfully handled in 2024
- 98% reduction in connection costs, saving nearly £300k annually
- Automation that saved 13.5 days of manual switchboard work in February 2025 alone
- A more resilient, scalable network that supports future innovation
This transformation has simplified communication, reduced costs, and freed up valuable staff time to focus on patient care.
Best Use of Digital and Data: FutureNow Networks
Our second nomination, Connecting Care: Modernising Network Infrastructure with Block, celebrates how our FutureNow Networks solution is helping NHS Trusts unlock the power of data by modernising ageing infrastructure.
FutureNow Networks have helped Trusts across the UK:
- Deliver zero-downtime migrations and improved resilience across entire hospital estates
- Reduce network recovery times by 80% and cost to serve by 50%
- Support critical rollouts like electronic patient records (EPR) and ePrescribing
- Enhance cybersecurity with micro-segmentation and full endpoint visibility
Trusts like North Bristol, University Hospitals of North Midlands, and Mid and South Essex are now better equipped to deliver safer, faster, and more connected care.
Thank you to our teams, partners and clients
Being finalists in two categories is a huge achievement and reflects the dedication of our people, the trust of our clients, and the support of our technology partners. Whilst being shortlisted is wonderful, what excites us most is continuing to innovate, to push boundaries, and to work side by side with our clients to support them in their mission-critical work.
