SOURCES SOUGHT
D -- RFI - Telecommunications Modernization Plan
- Notice Date
- 7/20/2005
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- NAICS
- 517910
— Other Telecommunications
- Contracting Office
- United States Senate, Office of the Sergeant at Arms, Finance Division, United States Senate, Washington, DC, 20510-7207
- ZIP Code
- 20510-7207
- Solicitation Number
- Reference-Number-RFI-2005-R-081
- Response Due
- 8/5/2005
- Archive Date
- 8/6/2005
- Description
- THIS IS A REQUEST FOR INFORMATION ONLY. THERE IS NO SOLICITATION AVAILABLE AT THIS TIME. THIS IS NOT A FORMAL REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL. The United States Senate Office of the Sergeant at Arms (SAA) seeks information about telecommunications solutions to upgrade or replace its existing telecommunications services, systems and infrastructure with new, improved technologies. Specifically, the SAA wishes to consider merging its voice and data infrastructure and transitioning from a Time Division Multiplex (TDM) voice network managed solution to an Internet Protocol (IP) or IP-enabled solution. Therefore, the SAA has released this RFI to: 1. Provide information to potential industry offerors explaining the needs and acquisition approach for the SAA?s Telecommunications Modernization Project (TMP) and 2. Solicit comments from industry on how to best satisfy the SAA TMP. The scope of the solution sought by this RFI includes the telecommunications switching equipment needed, the replacement of or interface to existing SAA adjunct systems, and new Operations Support System (OSS) software. Also included are the systems integration services required to install the new equipment and to conduct the transition process to move from the existing environment to the new TMP environment with minimum disruption to the end users. Operations and maintenance support after the transition and training support are included as well. Locations involved in the TMP are the: 1. Capitol Hill campus area comprising six major buildings and several smaller buildings or locations within buildings, 2. Alternate Computing Facility (ACF) outside Washington, D.C., and 3. Senators? state offices, which should be able to be incorporated into the upgraded telecommunications system in the future after first completing the upgrade in the Washington, D.C. area. The SAA seeks comments on alternative solutions for the architecture, means to implement the telecommunications upgrade, and standards to use. Suggested alternative solutions must ensure that: 1. Quality of Service (QoS) is at least the same or better than the existing services, 2. No single point of failure exists, 3. Automatic recovery and self-healing processes for failures are in place, 4. Centrex functions (currently provided by a DMS-100) and features (including E911) are supported, 5. On-net to on-net calls are not blocked, 6. Objective real time measurements of voice quality are available, 7. Availability values are commensurate with industry best practices, 8. There is the ability to scale the deployed system to accommodate at least 12,000 lines, and 9. COTS products (hardware and software), which have been in active service for at least one year in a large customer or carrier environment, are used in the deployed system. The modernized telecommunications system must support, at least, the following adjunct services and functions: 1. Broadcast fax, 2. Voice teleconferencing, 3. Voice mail, 4. Voice mail to digital file conversion, 5. Web conferencing, 6. Video teleconferencing, 7. Capitol Exchange call center, 8. Broadcast telephone messages for notifications of voting and other legislative actions, 9. Direct connections to the Capitol Exchange for call assistance by Senators, 10. Immediate connections to the US Capitol Police for emergencies with minimal (911) or no dialing required, and 11. Interconnection with a Dialogic Communications Corporation notification system. The SAA seeks comments and recommendations for a single comprehensive Operations Support System for voice, wireless, and data services. Suggestions on how to modernize the Senate?s telecommunications services may include upgrades to or replacement of elements of the SAA?s OSSs. Specifically such a system must interface with the wireline voice system to provide the following functions: 1. Placement and tracking of wireline moves, adds, changes, and disconnect orders, 2. Processing of CDRs and SMDRs for generating bills, 3. Asset and configuration management, 4. Intrusion detection and intrusion prevention systems, 5. Network management systems of the voice system, 6. Trouble reporting and tracking, 7. Directory services, 8. QoS measurements for any IP-based voice traffic, and 9. Provision of backup and recovery capabilities for critical OSS files. The acquisition approach includes consideration of the two issues described below. 1. Ownership versus Managed Services: In general, the Senate prefers to own the equipment it uses to provide services. The Senate is interested in learning industry?s opinions as to the pros and cons of ownership versus managed service. 2. Warranty and Long Term Maintenance Support Agreements: In regard to warranty and long term maintenance agreements, the SAA wishes to understand: a. The duration and scope of the warranty for equipment and services provided which might be offered under a contract, b. What additional support may be acquired after the warranty period ends, c. The costs for additional support after the warranty period, and d. The term of availability for the additional support. The SAA will consider the ease of transition, scalability, expandability, availability, maintainability, QoS, and security, when evaluating recommended alternative solutions. Respondents should comment on these topics and may suggest others for consideration. Respondents are encouraged to be as specific as possible in addressing issues discussed in this RFI. Feedback of a general or non-specific nature is less useful and will have limited utility in refining the acquisition strategy and impacting the content of an RFP. The SAA invites comments on all aspects of the SAA TMP acquisition. Respondents should: 1. Identify security vulnerabilities associated with their proposed solution and describe how to mitigate or eliminate these vulnerabilities, 2. Propose and describe the architecture to accommodate the solution including: a. Discussion of the infrastructure required, b. How a single point of failure would be eliminated, c. Automatic recovery and self-healing processes for failures, d. How on-net to on-net call blocking would be avoided, e. The maximum number of busy hour call completions which could be accommodated, and f. How scalability would be accommodated and the level to which the solution could be scaled. 3. Suggest appropriate COTS products and/or services for implementing the alternative solution, 4. Comment on what SLAs, if any, should be incorporated into a contract, 5. Indicate which adjunct systems should be integrated into the recommended alternative solution and which systems should be standalone and only interface with the solution, 6. Comment on the OSS platform, 7. Recommend a VoIP network management system and describe its capabilities, 8. Comment on what percent availability the recommended solution would have, the means to achieve this availability, and the respondent?s definition of availability, 9. Comment on how to achieve voice quality of service, 10. Describe how E911 calling would be implemented, 11. List the standards to which the proposed solution would adhere, and 12. Comment, in general terms on the adequacy and reasonableness of the capabilities and functions identified in this RFI. The SAA invites all sources of information to respond to this request. Responses to this request are due no later than August 5, 2005 at 12:00 Noon EDT and shall be submitted electronically via email only to acquisitions@saa.senate.gov. Response shall not exceed 40 pages. The subject line of the email message must be RFI 2005-R-081 Telecommunications Modernization Plan. Access to information in any files attached to the response is the responsibility of the submitting party. The SAA is not responsible for any failure to access information. The information supplied in response to this request will not be used to pre-qualify vendors or suppliers for purposes of soliciting proposals. Neither the Senate nor the SAA will be responsible for any costs for the preparation of responses to this request. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL. THIS NOTICE CONSTITUTES THE ENTIRE REQUEST FOR INFORMATION AND IS THE ONLY INFORMATION PROVIDED BY THE SAA OR U.S. SENATE. ANY TELEPHONE OR E-MAIL REQUESTS FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION WILL NOT BE HONORED.
- Place of Performance
- Address: Washington, DC
- Zip Code: 20510
- Country: USA
- Zip Code: 20510
- Record
- SN00851386-W 20050722/050720212753 (fbodaily.com)
- Source
-
FedBizOpps.gov Link to This Notice
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