The Carelink hosting platform was begun in 1997, following a conversation with the NHS Information Authority.

Although we started by hosting NHS trust websites, we recognised a need for commercial sector organisations to use our hosting platform to provide services to the NHS without the complexity, delay and expenseof developing their own solution. Since 2003 we became the health business of ioko and have actively provided hosting services to NHS commercial sector partners.

The only other companies able to offer this service are BT and Cable and Wireless.