Provision of DVLA Legislative,Compliance and Continuous Improvement Service Delivery Capability

Description

Summary of the work DVLA requires a supplier to provide a supply of highly skilled engineering developers/support resource to aide in the design, development, and support of the departments legislative, compliance and service improvement programmes. Expected Contract Length 18 months Latest start date Tuesday 1 March 2022 Budget Range Estimated contract value of £3.0 million. The total value of all Statements of Work commissioned under the proposed call-off agreement will not exceed £3.0 million. Why the Work is Being Done DVLA is responding swiftly to changes in motoring legislation and is changing and improving a wide range of systems to support the motor industry and the general public. This requires skills in modern technologies like containers and serverless and also across legacy technologies including CAGen, Weblogic, Scala, Natural and Adabas. DVLA is seeking a supplier to provide expertise and specialism to boost capacity and enhance capability in order to meet the outcomes of this requirement. We require a supplier who is able to help us to uplift our internal capability with a range of skills, whilst providing a short-term uplift in capacity to assist in the delivery of a number of technical deliverables. DVLA will take the lead responsibility for delivery of programmes. The supplier will work as part of DVLA blended teams (work will be agreed via individual Statements of Work). We are therefore looking for a supplier who will be able to provide these capabilities in one contract. This service provision needs to be able to provide technically skilled, experienced resource to deliver the technical solutions to meet DVLAs ambitious IT legislative and service improvement agenda. Problem to Be Solved DVLA requires a supplier to provide a flexible delivery of highly skilled Engineering developers/support services to aide in the design, development, and support of transformation solutions, working closely with our Development Teams and able to solve complex problems, via a call off agreement to; • Develop existing services and also introduce new internal and external facing services, • Support DVLAs digital strategy by creating online services and digital channels to improve overall customer service • Deliver on DVLA’s legislative commitments. Capability provided under SOWs will need to work closely with the current DVLA product teams. The supplier may also be required to support the components developed under these programmes of work. This would cover 4th line support (primarily investigation and code changes) both in hours and out of hours. All deliverables will be in line with DVLA solutions. The appointed supplier shall have the ability to deliver a mix of engineering services in line with outcome based deliverables, as set out in the individual Statements of Work as well as having the ability to interact and give guidance on best practice and react to technical challenges. DVLA is responsible for the overall business requirements and solution architecture. Who Are the Users DVLA Business transformation projects, Information Assurance Group, Cyber Security, existing business areas (e.g. Human Resources, Finance, Estates), General Public, Other government departments. Mixture of internal and external facing systems: Internal – transactional processing, data sharing, reporting and MI. External – Public facing applications and enquiries. Early Market Engagement There has been no early market engagement. Work Already Done The Legislative and Compliance and Service Improvement programmes have delivered major outcomes successfully over the last two years and have a range of future legislative and service enhancement commitments planned. These will continue to change how our customers, our people and our stakeholders will interact with our services whilst support the Government’s legislative objectives for transport. Existing Team DVLA has a number of digital development teams working on a range of different projects and business as usual activities using Agile methodology. The existing Product teams in DVLA includes Technical Product Managers, Agile Delivery Managers, Delivery Managers, Business Analysts, Software Engineers, Infrastructure Engineers, Testers, Cloud Engineers, Platform Engineers, Solution Architects. The product teams are blended squads working closely with business Service Designers and UX/UI. A typical DVLA squad consists of Software Engineers, Architect, an Agile Delivery Manager, Product Owner, SDET and Technical Product Manager, with governance and change delivery from a project manager. There is no current incumbent Supplier. Current Phase Not applicable Skills & Experience • For information: Criteria set for the Essential and Nice to Have Skills and Experience will be weighted at 20% of the overall 60% technical competence weighting. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of supplying an Engineering squad-based service across required technologies (CA Gen/Weblogic, Scala, Natural) to an enterprise sized environment and multi-vendor landscape, supported by delivery examples. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of working in a successful agile delivery environment, including through blended customer / supplier implementations. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of delivering projects using modern delivery concepts such as Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery pipelines. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of construction and delivery of enterprise scale integration solutions using serverless and java technologies. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of supplying a squad-based engineering service able to enforce best practice delivery and support processes in line with an end client’s own coding standards. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience delivering on a public cloud, including AWS and Microsoft Azure/365. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience delivering applications on CA Gen. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of delivering into AWS (Amazon Web Services) with a particular focus on API Gateway, Cognito, Lamdba, S3, Dynamo & other Serverless technologies. Nice to Haves • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience delivering solutions using Java, REST API, OpenAPI specs. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of test automation using Ruby and Cucumber. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of OAuth 2 security. • Provide demonstrable evidence and experience of Atlassian toolset (with a focus on JIRA, bitbucket) and Git. Work Location The work will take place in DVLA offices in Swansea (DVLA, Morriston, Swansea & DVLA, RLDC, Swansea), however in light of the current COVID-19 outbreak and in line with Government guidance in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, supplier resource will work remotely (within the UK). At the point where ‘working from home’ restrictions are lifted the supplier resource could be required to work onsite at the DVLA’s Swansea offices. This will be agreed within further Statement of Work iterations. Working Arrangments Full Time, 5 days a week, The charging mechanism in place for the Call-Off Contract and any agreed Statements of Work will be Time & Materials. Suppliers shall provide transparency to the Buyer on the rates paid to resources & any third-parties in the supply-chain on request. Where applicable expenses shall be submitted in line with the Buyers Standard T&S policy and agreed in advance. Statements of Work will be issued to define the deliverables. The supplier’s team will need to work effectively with existing and future teams (both civil servants & other suppliers). Security Clearance BPSS with Basic Disclosure (issued by Disclosure&Barring Service). SC may be required for further work but will be sponsored by DVLA. All resource is required to achieve 3-months residency in the UK in addition to BPSS prior to working with or on behalf of DVLA, (5-years residency for SC). Additional T&Cs Suppliers must be able to provide resources with current BPSS clearance within a 2-week notice period with the necessary skills to minimise impact on delivery. All candidates submitted by the supplier must be able to meet SC clearance requirements (if required). We have determined that this procurement represents a supply of resource – the off-payroll rules will apply to any workers engaged through a qualifying intermediary, such as their own limited company. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 10 Proposal Criteria • For information: Criteria set for the proposal elements will be weighted at 40% of the overall 60% technical competence weighting. • Describe how you will ensure DVLA is supplied with high quality and appropriately skilled resources and how you can commit to meet DVLA's continuous need for Development and engineering squads. • Describe your overall Engineering Approach along with Delivery and support Methodology and how this can be utilised to support DVLA’s objectives. • Explain your method for attracting/recruiting/retaining/replacing high quality, appropriately skilled resources in line with the 2-week notice and what internal processes you’ll undertake to ensure they match our requirements. • Provide one or more client focused examples where your organisation has provided the desired service capability, including evidence of integrating into and improve client culture and capability. Cultural Fit Criteria • For information: Criteria set for the Cultural Fit (including Social Value) elements will be weighted at 20%. • Provide demonstrable evidence of a clear process for transferring knowledge to permanent staff within a client organisation. • Provide demonstrable evidence of being able to work as part of an integrated, effective, and efficient delivery team, integrating into, and improving client culture and capability. • For information: Social Value - criteria drawn from Procurement Policy Note 06/20 Taking Account of Social Value in the Award of Central Government Contracts: • Social Value Theme 2 ‘Tackling economic inequality’- MAC 2.3 Create new businesses, new jobs and new skills. • Social Value Theme 5 ‘Wellbeing’ - MAC 8.2 Improve community integration. Payment Approach Time and materials Assessment Method • Case study • Work history • Reference • Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 20% Price 20% Questions from Suppliers 1. Is it possible to deliver some/all of the outcomes within the EEA in combination with onshore teams/resources? Please refer to the advert - 'The work will take place in DVLA offices in Swansea (DVLA, Morriston, Swansea & DVLA, RLDC, Swansea), however in light of the current COVID-19 outbreak and in line with Government guidance in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, supplier resource will work remotely (within the UK). At the point where ‘working from home’ restrictions are lifted the supplier resource could be required to work onsite at the DVLA’s Swansea offices. This will be agreed within further Statement of Work iterations.' 2. Can you please confirm if this opportunity is a replacement for the previously issued opportunity: Provision of Software Engineering Services – PS/21/99, DOS Notice 15227. DVLA can confirm this is a separate opportunity to Provision of Software Engineering Services – PS/21/99. 3. Please can the authority clarify how much Scala and Natural will be needed as part of the required technologies for this project? DVLA are in the process of growing their in-house capability of the Natural skill-set and a Supplier who could supplement this internal capability would be a bonus. DVLA have a greater need for Scala expertise and have an initial estimated demand for the provision of two engineers with this skill-set. 4. Is it mandatory to deliver the entire service from within the UK? Is an engagement model combining UK and the EEA acceptable? DVLA require resource to work collaboratively from within the UK. The work will take place in DVLA offices in Swansea (DVLA, Morriston, Swansea & DVLA, RLDC, Swansea), however in light of the current COVID-19 outbreak and in line with Government guidance in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, supplier resource will work remotely (within the UK). At the point where ‘working from home’ restrictions are lifted the supplier resource could be required to work onsite at the DVLA’s Swansea offices. This will be agreed within further Statement of Work iterations 5. How many resources do you estimate will be required? What proportion per technology listed? Please see the below requirements.Technical Product Manager x 1Project Manager x 1Solution Architect x 1Business Analyst x 1 Platform Engineer x 1Software Engineer (Lead/Senior) x 2SDET (Software Development Engineer in Test) x 1 Suppliers will also be asked to provide costs for the below roles (for information purposes at this stage)Enterprise Architect x 1UX x 1 Agile Delivery Manager x 1 Software Engineer (Junior) x 1 Test Engineer x 1 6. If we have competency in only some of the listed technologies but not all, will this disqualify us? Suppliers are able to bid and all bids will be evaluated by SME’s to ensure a fair process. Suppliers that meet the set criteria will progress to the next stage. 7. Can the authority please provide additional information on the need to have past experience of CA Gen, given this is relatively old tech, as we’re curious as to how it will feature as part of your future improvement plans. The Agency has set out a path for its future technical landscape, however this is expected to take a number of years to achieve fully given the scale and complexity of business systems. Therefore there is a need to continue to support and develop on a range of existing technologies, of which CA Gen is one.