Thank you to everyone who has responded to my posting both through the Blog and via email. The response was generally positive, with a number of respondents making comments on the changing market and welcoming a more flexible strategy to meet the Government’s requirements. In particular, the majority of industry and agency respondents were positive about reduced lease terms and space/kW requirements.
A number of questions were raised by respondents. In the interests of transparency, our responses to these have been amalgamated into the comments below.
1 What is the scope of the new arrangements?
At present Finance is still in the consultation phase of this process. The full scope of the new arrangements has yet to be determined.
2. Will the new arrangements be open to new data centre sites in all jurisdictions or only particular areas?
As stated previously, Finance is still undertaking the consultation phase for this process. Factors such as the location of new data centre sites are being considered as part of this.
3. Will the new arrangements allow data centre providers to provide services relating to commitments of less than 10 years, 500m2 or 500kW?
Yes, it is intended that a new approach to the market will allow for lower minimums than were available to agencies under previous arrangements. Feedback from agencies has shown that there is a significant demand for leases for less than 10 years, 500m2 or 500kW, particularly among agencies with low compute requirements or an interest in moving to cloud arrangements. Tailoring the new arrangements to meet this demand will give agencies greater flexibility in their ICT Strategies and enable them to take up new technologies as they become available.
4. Will existing Panellists be required, or able to, respond to any tender request?
Existing Panellists will not be required to reapply, however may wish to use the opportunity to expand their service offerings.
5. The existing Panel arrangement ends in 2015, unless it is extended. When will the new arrangements expire?
As mentioned previously, Finance is still in the consultation phase of this process. Expiration dates for any new arrangements have not been decided as yet. However, as with the current Panel it may operate for 5 years with the option to extend with increased flexibility to take into account technological advances.
6. Will the technical and operational requirements of the new tender request be the same as the original tender request? E.g. Uptime Institute Tier III certification.
Based on feedback it is likely that there will be some variations to the technical and operational requirements for the new arrangements.
7. Why are there only Tier 3 data centres and higher on the Panel?
This is for the simple reason that the applications to the original Data Centre Facilities Panel procurement were all for Tier 3 facilities. However, we are aware that there is a demand for high quality Tier 2 facilities among agencies and would consider including this category in the next approach to market.
8. Will existing leases between agencies and Panellists be affected by a new approach to market?
No, leases that have already been signed under the Data Centre Facilities Panel will not be impacted by a new approach to market. However, we may need to consider transition arrangements in the future.
9. Will the new approach to market cater for arrangements where a third party provides and operates the ICT (including data storage) for an agency?
The existing Data Centre Facilities Head Agreement allows an agency to contract a third party service provider to administer their data centre environment on their behalf. This will be extended to any future arrangements.
10. A mandatory data centre facilities panel unnecessarily separates the data centre facility from the overall service and constrains the ability for agencies to take up ‘as a service’ models for infrastructure, software and development.
The Panel is intended for agencies that require physical space in a secure data centre environment. It does not prevent an agency from adopting cloud (as a service) arrangements or from securing a third party provider to provide their overarching ICT requirements.
Each agency has its own ICT Strategy that addresses their business requirements. This enables the agency to determine what commercial arrangements best align with their business needs regardless of whether these are achieved through multiple contracts with vendors, a single managed service or a private cloud arrangement.
It should be noted that a number of the facilities on the Panel offer full service arrangements, through which they provide the ICT and staff to operate an agency’s data centre environment. Some of these vendors also offer cloud and cloud-like services, which can be demonstrated through the Data Centre as a Service Multi Use List (DCaaS MUL).
The proposed new arrangements may offer agencies the flexibility to plan for and implement changes in technology. As an example, agencies considering moving their data to the cloud will be able to enter arrangements that would accommodate a transition to the cloud/cloud-like services.
11. Will Finance be extending the DCaaS MUL to allow contracts over $80,000 and 12 months?
While the current focus is on the Data Centre Facilities Panel, we welcome comments on other facets of the Data Centre Strategy. The possibility of extending the DCaaS MUL has been raised by a number of respondents. This does appear to be an area of growth in the market, and we will be reviewing potential opportunities for government in this space.
12. There is a pattern where the majority of government agencies are not considering data centres that exist outside of Canberra.
To date there has been more interest in Canberra based data centres. However, there is demand for data centre facilities outside the ACT, particularly among agencies with smaller requirements. We believe that by reducing the minimum requirements under Panel arrangements, these agencies will have greater flexibility to seek arrangements that meet their needs. This will allow agencies with requirements of less than 10 years or 500m2/500kW to engage directly with the Panellists, instead of through Consortium Arrangements as was previously required.
13. If there is sufficient space available through existing arrangements, why is Finance considering a refresh?
We see a new approach to the market as an opportunity to embrace innovation in the market and meet changing agency demands. While the original procurement met the requirements as they were at the time, both technology and agency requirements have moved on and have highlighted the need for more flexible and dynamic services.
There are technologies in the market today that had not been realised in 2009. In the data centre environment, the past few years have yielded advances in such things as efficiency measures, free air cooling technologies and server design, as well as the growth in cloud services.
As the environment has matured, so have agency requirements for data centre space. Agencies which previously required large ICT environments are now able to provision services in a smaller higher density environment, thereby reducing their costs.
We recognise that our existing Panellists have expanded or added to their data centre facilities. We believe this is an opportunity for existing Panellists to consider whether they want to expand their offerings to Government.
14. What about other AGIMO panel arrangements? Will these also be opened up earlier than the nominated panel expiry dates?
A number of ICT Panels are approaching refresh cycles within the next 24 months. Finance will provide updates on these through the AGIMO Blog as relevant.