This is a Ministry of Defence variation of 'Design & Build', whereby the 'Prime Contractor' is not only responsible for the design and production of the facility but also the maintenance and service over the facility's full lifetime. Prime Contracting is designed to take advantage of collaborative working and supply chain management through incentivised pricing arrangements. The Prime Contractor may be a design organisation, facilities manager, financier or more likely a major 'Design & Build' contractor. However, by their very nature prime contracts tend to be large projects requiring substantial resources and project management skills, but although each project has only one Prime Contractor, it is likely that there will be many 'works package' contractors engaged under 'framework' agreements. [CEM]

Accompanied by Owlion cd "Prime contracting" which is catalogued separately at J114936