Department of Veterans Affairs, Acquisition Operations Service (93C), 810 Vermont Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20420-0000

D -- INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SERVICES, INCLUDING TELECOMMUNICATIONS SERVICES (PROCUREMENT) DUE 090297 POC Laura Zotian (202)273-8091 The Department of Veterans Affairs is requesting industry comments on the solicitation for Wide Area Network Services. The VA anticipates a procurement for the replacement of its current Wide Area Network, the Integrated Data Communications Utility (IDCU), by October 1998. The IDCU is a "utility" type telecommunications services that provides connectivity, capacity, and network support for the entire Department. The IDCU currently consists of X.25 and Frame Relay, with the majority of new services and traffic increases satisfied by Frame Relay. The IDCU network carries approximately 225 GB of X.25 traffic per month and 1400 GB Frame Relay traffic per month. Total network traffic is estimated to grow to 6000 GB per month by 2000, and could expand to 15,000 GB by 2010. Current plans call for a competitive solicitation for a full service, single source, network service manager. It is anticipated that the network service manager will employ one or more transport suppliers as we ll as commercially available network management services. The entire Request for Comments (RFC) document and response details can be found on VA's World Wide Web page at http://www.va.gov/oa&;mm/busopp/wanrfc.htm. Contqact Laura Zotian at (202)273-8091 or e-mail at Laura,Zotian@mail.va.gov with any questions. (0211)

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