US Postal Service, Headquarters Automation Purchasing, 8403 Lee Highway, Merrifield, Virginia 22082-8150

A -- USPS RECOGNITION IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM POC Thomas A. Fallon FAX (703) 280-8412 E-MAIL: Recognition Improvement, tafallon@email.usps.gov. The US Postal Service is seeking sources and qualification statements from firms who currently have address recognition systems developed for US letter mail. The US Postal Service has a requirement to upgrade the address recognition on its letter mail processing equipment. Upgrades can consist of either software that executes on existing US Postal Service hardware or both hardware and software. There will be a competitive test in the early October 1999. This test shall consist of injecting mail piece images into the systems submitted for test. The mail piece images will be in DAFS format. Any systems submitted for test shall be required to output destination ZIP Code data in a US Postal Service defined format. A copy of the specification that defines the required output data format will be available from Automation Procurement. The mail piece images used for this test will be captured from actual mail as it is processed on existing letter mail processing equipment at numerous US Postal Service processing centers. In the July/August time frame two test sets of images will be provided to qualified vendors. One set shall consist of images of randomly selected mail pieces. The second set shall consist of images of mail pieces for which the current address recognition systems could not determine a delivery ZIP Code. Vendors that have not provided address recognition systems to the US Postal Service in the past shall be required to demonstrate their capability prior to taking part in the competitive test. This demonstration shall consist of either demonstrating consistent performance with the current address recognition system for the random test set of images or determining a delivery ZIP Code for a reasonable number of the images in the unresolved test set. A letter request for proposal will be issued within 30 days. Cost savings and performance will be the determining criteria for selection. Vendors submitting systems for test shall be required to also submit cost and technical proposals prior to the startof the test. Posted 05/28/99 (W-SN337035). (0148)

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