DE&S - SharePoint Consultancy and Development Services

Description

Summary of the work DE&S require resources to work alongside the DE&S Digital team to deliver software development. Expected Contract Length 2 years with the option to extend for a further 6 months Latest start date Monday 17 May 2021 Budget Range The anticipated budget of up to £7m excluding VAT. Please provide a rate card for evaluation. Why the Work is Being Done DE&S require resources to assist with the Software Development (SharePoint, Office 365 and other languages), QA, Test and Release Management and Business Analysis for a portfolio of digital projects. DE&S envisage the need for Front end and Back end developers, Scrum Master/s, Business Analyst/s, UI/UX Consultants and a Test Team consisting of, for example, Senior Testers and a Test Manager of various SFIA Levels. Problem to Be Solved DE&S would like to engage with a specialist delivery partner who has a proven track record in the delivery of large-scale and complex digital projects. DE&S are particularly interested in Delivery Partners with extensive experience of delivering content management solutions for complex problems in the engineering space. One of the first pieces of work will be the DE&S ASPIRE programme, which is standardising airworthiness management through the introduction of new tools to further align our processes. The tools will be developed with key SMEs in consultation with Operating Centre and Delivery Team peers, the MAA and industry, and they will be hosted on the DAT Air Safety Portal. Who Are the Users DE&S employees need to be able to use the applications to help carry out elements of their role. Specific business needs will vary between applications. Early Market Engagement None Work Already Done A range of applications are currently in development with an emerging pipeline of further applications being examined. Existing Team DE&S Digital delivery team Current Phase Alpha Skills & Experience • All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years. • Have demonstrable experience of developing SharePoint solutions within a tightly restricted and secure target application development environment, and subject to approved third-party add-ons and toolsets. • Have demonstrable experience of using industry-standard design, coding and QA standards and security frameworks (e.g. OWASP Top 10 and Sans Top 25) for a Defence or Government client. • Have demonstrable experience with an agile methodology and the associated tooling such as Jira and Azure DevOps for planning, tasking and reporting. • Have demonstrable experience of SharePoint, PowerApps and the SPFX development platform, plus languages such as C#, CSS, JavaScript, HTML5, Bootstrap, TSQL, React, and Angular. • Have demonstrable experience of providing a multi-disciplinary team: front end developers, backend developers, software architects, business analysts, DBA’s, ETL specialists etc. • Have demonstrable experience of using engineering expertise to supplement the subject-matter expertise represented by the client-supplied Product Owner role in an agile environment. • Have demonstrable experience of delivering an enterprise-class technical solution, securing the achievement of rigorous safety standards (e.g. MAA), in a highly regulated engineering environment, combining multiple work processes. • Have demonstrable experience of implementing an enterprise solution using customised workflow management and latest SharePoint development platform, incorporating Portal technology for information access. • Have demonstrable experience of implementing an enterprise solution producing compliance and governance reporting via the latest Microsoft data visualisation technology, using a combination of SharePoint and SQL Server data. • The staff you provide must have SC level security clearance. Nice to Haves • All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years. • Demonstrate experience of providing additional business value when acting as part of blended Software Delivery Team. Please be specific in terms of the value achieved, and level of innovation supplied. • Have demonstrable industry-certified engineering skills relevant to the Defence Sector, which are held by permanent employees of your company, that can be applied to domain-specific (e.g. Air) safety context. • Show In your response how one or more of your teams has developed a piece of work that has been delivered to GDS Digital Design Standards (or equivalent standard). • Have a current and direct Microsoft Partner status that is most supportive of the technical skills requirements described in Essential skills and experience section. • Demonstrate experience of integrating various MS technologies (such as Sharepoint, PowerApps, Power BI). • Demonstrate evidence of having worked in projects which have had to scale their implementation of agile practices. Work Location The supplier's resources will be expected to work onsite at Abbey Wood, Bristol (COVID 19 dependent). MODNET laptops will be provided to allow for remote working. Working Arrangments The Supplier will work as part of the DE&S Digital Application Services delivery team, and they will be viewed as part of the overall Delivery Team with a 'one team' ethos. The DE&S Digital projects will follow Agile principles. It is expected that the successful supplier will follow the same approach. Expenses to and from the Base Location in Abbey Wood, Bristol are not eligible to claim. Any expenses outside of the Base Location must be agreed in advance with the DE&S Delivery Manager and shall be in accordance with the MOD Business and Travel policy for Travel and Subsistence. Security Clearance SC clearance is required. The Authority WILL NOT sponsor SC Clearance; it must be in place upon commencement of the contract and remain valid for the contract's duration. Additional T&Cs The payment method for this Call-Off Contract is the Buyer’s e-payment system “CP&F” (Contracting, Purchasing & Finance) in accordance with the following conditions where “Contractor” shall mean the Supplier and “Authority” shall mean the Buyer: DEFCON* 5J DEFCON* 129J DEFCON* 522 You can find further details on CP&F at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mod-contracting-purchasing-and-finance-e-procurement-system The successful supplier must comply with relevant DE&S and wider MOD policies and standards. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria • (25%) Your proposal should demonstrate your approach to Software Development, QA, Test/Release Management, Business Analysis for an enterprise grade solution delivered within a highly regulated and safety-controlled engineering environment. • (15%) Your proposal should demonstrate your teams’ experience of and skills in delivering a SharePoint solution relevant to DE&S’ requirement, providing sample evidence of professional skill-sets used. • (15%) Your proposal should demonstrate your approach and methodology to ensure that resources are successfully embedded (and measured) within DE&S, providing a one team ethos for delivery. • (10%) Please demonstrate your ability to scale a relevant multi-disciplinary team from your permanent employees, giving examples of where this has been successful. Include how you’ll manage their work/maintain quality. Cultural Fit Criteria • (5%) Demonstrate how you have formed and deployed a complete project team, with the right cultural fit, to deliver a successful major SharePoint-related project, within a constrained timeframe. • (5%) Demonstrate how you work as a team, manage collaboration, share best practice and motivate & maintain high levels of engagement within teams and how this links to our values. Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method Reference Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 65% Cultural fit 10% Price 25% Questions from Suppliers 1. Is there a current incumbent providing these services? If yes, can the Authority say who the incumbent is? Yes, the incumbent supplier is Civica UK Ltd. 2. At the beginning of the Essential and Nice-to-have skills you have stated the following: “All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years”. As this will be a submission question on the DOS portal, can you please confirm whether this is just a statement or do you want suppliers to provide a 100-word answer to each of them? “All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years” is a statement and does not require an answer. 3. Are you expecting a response to both questions “All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years.”? “All experience referred to below to be within the last 3 years” is a statement and does not require an answer. 4. Is SC Required or will you be able to provide sponsorship for this project? SC clearance is required.The Authority will not sponsor SC Clearance; it must be in place upon commencement of the contract and remain valid for the contract's duration. 5. One of the nice to have skills says “Have demonstrable industry-certified engineering skills relevant to the Defence Sector, which are held by permanent employees of your company, that can be applied to domain-specific (e.g. Air) safety context”.Could the Authority please elaborate on what kind of industry-certification they are expecting? When referring to 'industry-certified engineering skills relevant to the Defence Sector', the Authority is referring to qualifications such as Aerospace or Aeronautical Engineering Degrees (BEng or MEng) or equivalents. 6. What Content Management System are you looking to utilise for this project? Is Adobe AEM in scope? SharePoint is our chosen content management system. Adobe is out of scope. 7. Regarding question 1 – “Have demonstrable experience of developing SharePoint solutions within a tightly restricted and secure target application development environment, and subject to approved third-party add-ons and toolsets.”Can you please define further and give an example of “tightly restricted and secure target application development environment”? The environment is non internet facing and all software components are checked and validated before use from a security perspective. As a result, in some circumstances software components may not be available. 8. Regarding question 1 – “Have demonstrable experience of developing SharePoint solutions within a tightly restricted and secure target application development environment, and subject to approved third-party add-ons and toolsets.”Can you please define further and give an example of “third-party add-on/toolset”? Any software component that is not native to SharePoint is considered 3rd party and therefore subject to security policy. 9. For question 7 – “Have demonstrable experience of delivering an enterprise-class technical solution, securing the achievement of rigorous safety standards (e.g. MAA), in a highly regulated engineering environment, combining multiple work processes.”Would you accept experience of working within rigorous safety standards from outside the Aviation industry? Whilst experience working in the aviation industry is preferred, we're happy to consider a related industry that requires rigorous UK safety standards. 10. For question 7 – “Have demonstrable experience of delivering an enterprise-class technical solution, securing the achievement of rigorous safety standards (e.g. MAA), in a highly regulated engineering environment, combining multiple work processes.”Would you accept experience of working within rigorous safety standards from outside the UK? We are looking for UK regulatory experience. 11. How many Share Point licenses do you need/have? The environment is licensed for the requirements of the project. No further SharePoint licences are necessary. 12. Is the solution intended to be built using SharePoint Online/ SQL on Azure and Power Platform vs On-prem services? The solution is on-prem. 13. Does the proposed engagement model align with an Agile-based development approach and has a full-time product owner been assigned? Yes, the proposed engagement model aligns with an Agile-based development approach and a full-time product owner has been assigned. 14. What proportion of the current ASPIRE platform was/ has been delivered? Is the intention for any of this to remain/ will all functionality be replaced with the new solution? The intention is to carry on with the existing build, which is the first module of many related to the ASPIRE platform. 15. What external collaboration with industry is envisaged with the platform – has an authentication provider been identified already? There is no current requirement for external collaboration with industry. 16. What is the DAT Air Safety Portal and what platform is it hosted on? It is a Sharepoint portal hosted on MoDNET used by the air engineers. 17. Why is existing security clearance being sought when Annex A Statement of HMG Personnel Security and National Security Vetting Policy, para 3 states that "It is government policy that individuals should not be expected to hold an existing security clearance in order to apply for posts that require vetting, except where such posts are short term and need to be filled urgently". As the project requirement is for the development team to commence work as soon as the contract has been awarded, there is a need for suppliers to already have these clearances in place upon contract award. 18. RE question 12 “Have demonstrable industry-certified engineering skills relevant to the Defence Sector, which are held by permanent employees of your company, that can be applied to domain-specific (e.g. Air) safety context.”, and your subsequent clarification regarding BEng and MEng degrees.Are you looking for specifically degrees or would other relevant industry experience be accepted? We are not necessarily looking for specific degrees, the examples of Aerospace or Aeronautical Engineering Degrees (BEng or MEng) were requested to demonstrate the type of skills we are looking for. Other relevant qualifications and industry-certified skills and experience will be considered. 19. RE question 14 “Have a current and direct Microsoft Partner status that is most supportive of the technical skills requirements described in Essential skills and experience section.”Are we required to simply list our Microsoft Partner competencies, or should we provide an example delivery? Have a current and direct Microsoft Partner status that is most supportive of the technical skills requirements means providing the Authority with examples deliveries backed up with the relevant Microsoft Partner competencies. 20. Can the Authority please clarify if any part of the solution will be using MS Cloud Services, as power Apps is part of MS Cloud service and require licenses based on MS O365 licensing model? The authority is not currently using MS Cloud Services as the application environment (SharePoint) in on-prem, therefore MS O365 licensing is not necessary. 21. Hi Team,We understand from your previous answers that there is an incumbent supplier of these services. Please could you describe why this work is being competed now and if/how the scope of the service you are seeking differs from what the incumbent supplier is currently providing?Many thanks, The work is being competed as it is MOD policy to compete any requirement over £10,000. The scope of the work in terms of the services required and activities undertaken remains largely the same as what was contracted previously, however the budget has increased, as reflected by the estimated budget within the advert.