Windows only for $140m government tender

The Department of Corporate and Information Services (DCIS) has published a sourcing strategy document to help vendors form consortiums for the desktop and helpdesk services contract for nearly 10,000 computers.

The NT government first outsourced its desktop and helpdesk services in 2001. The $200 million deal was won by Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) and will expire on June 30, 2006.

For the new round of outsourcing, the government has again committed to the Windows platform as it wants to standardise. "The Northern Territory government will seek to significantly reduce the number of SOE's [standard operating environment] during the term of the contract," the DCIS said.

A refresh of its desktop fleet however may be some time away. "Hardware platforms are to remain the same for at least one year," the department said.

In addition, the government wants to outsource the management of nearly 2,000 printers and 165 file/print servers.

The upcoming tender has two main differences to the current CSC contract, according to Elise Vervetjes, ICT Projects director at the department.

First, the government has to option of moving to a managed-printing service, and the other is LAN infrastructure and management are no longer part of its outsourcing requirements. These areas will be managed by Telstra, which bagged a recent telecommunications services tender effective July 1, 2006.

Unlike many other government procurement plans, there will be no public tender. Instead, the DCIS will issue a request for tender to pre-qualified companies in September.