Technical support outputs for the Maritime Digital Delivery Services (MDDS) (ND-0269)

Description

Summary of the work "A service with the skills required to deliver change and sustain MDDS outputs essential for critical capabilities of Maritime Domain Awareness and cloud & hosting. This will support timely delivery of commitments made to the Navy Digital Board. - VFM - Increased economies of scale - Support for future expansion" Expected Contract Length 24 months Latest start date Monday 1 May 2023 Budget Range "The total contract value over 24 months must not exceed £9.96M. This will include the core services, plus any additional services agreed with the Authority and all agreed travel and subsistence. It is estimated that the core work can be delivered for up to £7.2M Ex VAT including all relevant T&S for which the authority expects c12,320 days of service provision throughout the 24 month period. There is an additional £2.76M Ex Vat for additional services that will be 'called off' as needed during the contract period. There is an option to extend by up to 25% time/cost or both. Why the Work is Being Done Maritime Digital Delivery Service (MDDS) provide cloud hosting and digital services optimised for use in the Maritime Domain. MDDS covers shore establishments to the Maritime 'edge’; enabling coherent, accessible data and secure, resilient and effective hosting, at sea on our ships and submarines, and in the littoral with the Commando Force. These services support the defence C5ISR function, Communication Information Systems (CIS) and intelligence, including the Recognised Maritime Picture (RMP). Key delivery includes but is not limited to Maritime Domain Awareness (infrastructure and application (DevOps)) and Navy Digital Hosting. To support this and deliver to the diverse needs outlined in the Navy Digital and Data Plan, MDDS require a multi-disciplinary team with a range of skills including Infrastructure engineering, solutions architecture and project management. A detailed breakdown of the statement of work will be provided to down-selected suppliers to allow preparation of the supplier proposal for stage 2. Problem to Be Solved "MDDS must deliver digital infrastructure change and sustain infrastructure operation management to meet the changing demands of the business across work packages relating to the overall digital programme, including: a. Leadership, support and sustainment of Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA), Navy Digital Hosting, Development Environment, Maritime Multi-Media (MMM), and Data Centre Rationalisation (DCR) Navy migrations. b. Limited ICT ‘Enabling Services’ to support development and delivery in the Maritime Domain – such as Software as a Service (SaaS), maritime deployed infrastructure discovery activity, fixed ICT change, and digital delivery management. MDDS must ensure that solutions are fit for purpose (adhering to MOD standards and security), VFM and designed to meet the future needs of the Navy. Supply must have the ability to flex as the business needs surge as part of programme deliveries, or for emerging requirements." Who Are the Users Navy Command personnel, of all ranks and rates, civilian, uniform and contractors providing services. Defence personnel with services supported by Navy Digital. Existing Team Navy Digital team embraces a "Whole work force" approach and comprises of a mixture of RN/RM Service personnel, MoD Civilian and specialist contractors. This Outcome will be expected to integrate with, support and draw upon members of the Navy Digital team when delivering this service. Current Phase Live Skills & Experience • experience in high-velocity delivery; onboarding, operating and managing multi-tenanted software defined datacentres and services within a MOD Maritime domain at classification up to and including SECRET. • Provision of Infrastructure service management including capacity and performance monitoring (PRTG), Availability management, Patch management, incident, and problem management and through life support of all MDA capabilities (utilising ITIL methodology). • experience in application of MoD standards for ICT, information security, digital design, delivery, compliance, safety, Maritime integration, and operations in fixed UK and overseas installations and on ships and submarines. • experience in delivering Core infra services in line with MOD security standards, for example system hardening and lock down • experience Designing, Developing, Deploying, and supporting Geospatial-temporal capability that can process, store and forward relevant Track Data and other multi-domain data sets in near-realtime into the Recognised Maritime Picture (RMP). • experience designing, implementing and deploying data science services for maritime operations research, data analysis activities and reporting. • experience installing and supporting ISR collection devices on deployed vessels in constrained environments • experience providing Infrastructure Engineering skills (for VMWare, vSphere, vSAN, NSX-T, Arista, Juniper, Cisco, Backup, NGINX, and Containerisation) • Provision of Infrastructure Engineering services to support Data Pipelines, enterprise messaging systems and Database technologies (Kafka, relational/NoSQL databases) Nice to Haves • Ability to work with wider MOD stakeholders to determine schedules, demand, capacity, define new or bespoke services required to successfully deliver for each and sometimes unique customer. • Experience processing digital/cloud-native OFFICIAL to SECRET solutions through JSP604 compliance and key approval stages, Authority to Test (AtT), Interim Authority to Operate (IATO) and Authority to Operate (ATO). • Experience in provision of Engineering Management Services including out of hours technical engineering support to provide implementation of industry best practice, engineering oversight and assurance activities. • Experience assessing suitability of a customers ability to be on-boarded into a modern Maritime / MOD cloud-based IaaS, be able to document this from a technical and feasibility perspective. • Demonstrate an understanding of UK Government Departments and MOD structures and policies as they relate to the digital and information outcomes in the Maritime domain. Work Location Principally centred in Portsmouth at Whale Island and Portsdown Technology Park, with the ability to work remotely. The Navy Digital Hosting (NDH), which this service supports, is located in Corsham, though primary interaction is remote. Task dependant travel to other MOD sites and elements of overseas travel may be required. Working Arrangments This service will be working in a team with stakeholders from within Navy Command, MoD, and other government departments to enable capability outcomes in support of MoD and HMG national security objectives. Security Clearance "Minimum MoD endorsed SC required at commencement of work. Delivery of the outputs includes working up to SUKEO. A minimum of 75% of the team require DV on start up. DV is required for specific engineering team members for administration activities on S. " Additional T&Cs "All overseas expenses (T&S) must be pre-agreed between supplier and Authority and must comply with the MoD Travel and Subsistence (T&S) Policy. All suppliers are obliged to provide sufficient guarantees to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures so that the processing meets the requirements of GDPR and ensures the protection of the rights of data subjects. For further information please see the Information Commissioner's Office website https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/data-protection-reform/overview-of-the-gdpr/" No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 3 Proposal Criteria • Technical Competence (70 marks) broken down into: • 1. Stage 1 relative score (10), • 1.1. Support operational activities and develop requirements that enhance and contribute to the national Recognised Maritime Picture (RMP) and improve Situational Awareness (10) • 1.2. Support current operational activities and develop requirements that enhance and contribute to bilateral and multi-national sharing of data and information. (10 • 1.3. Support the provision of data science services for maritime operations research, data analysis activities and reporting (10) • 1.4. Support and sustainment of Navy Digital development environment services. (3) • 1.5. Support migration, onboarding and service management (3) • 1.6. Support for technical delivery of fixed and deployed maritime digital infrastructure hosting capabilities at S and OS classifications. (4) • 2. Technical experience of the assigned workforce and team structure. (10) • 3. Risks, dependencies, assumptions and mitigation. (5) • Demonstrate how continuous improvement will be delivered during the contract period. (5) • (written proposal - 2000 words max, plus Work Histories for key roles - 500 words max) • Cost. (Overall price) (20 marks) (Financial proposal must be separate to the written proposals) • Cultural Fit/Social Values (10 marks) (100 words max per criterion)" Cultural Fit Criteria • Work as a team with our organisation and other suppliers and have a no-blame culture that encourages people to learn from their mistakes. (2) • Take responsibility for their work. (2) • Share knowledge and experience with other team members. (2) • Able to work with stakeholders with mixed/low technical expertise. (2) • Consider equality & inclusion in the provision & operation of services, including a workforce that is representative of the communities we serve, where relevant and proportionate. (2) Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method Work history Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 70% Cultural fit 10% Price 20% Questions from Suppliers 1. How will T&S be charged and payments made throughout the contract? "The contract value will include up to £50K of T&S to be invoiced as actuals in line with MoD T&S ratesThe £50K for T&S is not to be included within the bid tender.Foreign travel will require Authority approval before these costs are met. T&S throughout the contract will be limited to a maximum liability of £50K.The service delivery will be receipted and invoiced in arrears via C,P&F and EXOSTAR using the method of Capped time and materials." 2. Will this be assessed as inside IR35? It is not expected that IR35 will apply. An assessment will be made after the winning supplier has been selected. 3. Is there a Cyber Risk Assessment? The Cyber Risk Level is very low. Suppliers that are down selected will be required to complete a SAQ. 4. Is there an incumbent supplier in the role? No, there is not an incumbent delivering this requirement at this time, it is a new outcome. 5. Would you accept a DV cleared candidate? Yes, we would accept a candidate with a DV. 6. Will there be any performance indicators within the contract Performance indicators are required, these will be advised following down-selection 7. How will initial tender submissions be evaluated ( part 1) Each tenderer will be evaluated and allocated 0 (Not Met), 1 (Partially Met), 2 (Met) or 3 (Exceeded) against their responses to each of the essential and nice to have criteria. The points awarded for each criteria will be added together to give the total technical evaluation points. 8. How will initial tender submissions be evaluated (part 2) The Authority reserves the right to consider tenderers non-compliant if their points are below 2 on any criteria. Tenderers may also be considered non-compliant if their proposed start date is after the required start date, if their day rate is above the stated budget or fail to meet submission deadlines. Non-compliant tenderers will be excluded from the competition and their total technical evaluation points will be 0. 9. How will initial tender submissions be evaluated (part 3) Tenderers with the three highest total technical evaluation points from this evaluation will be down selected and invited to take part in stage two. 10. How will final tender submissions be evaluated after initial down selection The submitted proposals and work histories will form the basis of the evidence for selection during the final tender and will be scored using the following weighting: Technical competence 70%. Cultural fit 10%. Price 20%.