Dark Fiber Maintenance

Location

Description

The University of Edinburgh has a large and disparate estate which relies on connectivity to the university network via dark fiber. This contract is for the maintenance of dark fiber and does not include installation.

Total Quantity or Scope

The University has a large and disparate estate which relies on connectivity to the university via fiber cables. The connectivity is essential for learning and teaching, research, security, door access control and building management. This procurement is for the maintenance and lease of existing dark fiber cables for an initial period of 12 months, with two optional extensions of 12 months. Additional information: Please note - as this procurement is an NCA, no quality weighting was required however the system will not allow for this to be null. This procurement is for an initial period of 12 months and includes the option to extend by two further periods of 12 months.

Award Detail

Award Criteria

CPV Codes

• 32400000 - Networks

Legal Justification

The fiber connections includes those that were installed at the Universities request to connect two specific locations, and those installed directly by the University as part of the EasMAN (Metropolitan Area Network), which the university ran for the East of Scotland and are now maintained by Jisc. The cost of the fiber installations has already been incurred and this solely relates to the maintenance. Changing supplier of these fibers would incur additional installation costs for every dark fiber connection. Additionally, there are some locations which can only be delivered by JISC due to requiring a resilient link which is configured to match the primary link allowing traffic to be re-routed seamlessly. The University require the fiber network connections to be provided by one supplier otherwise there would be disproportionate technical difficulties in the operation and maintenance of the service with multiple varying policies to navigate and different escalation paths and contacts. Additionally, the University require a consistent way of monitoring security and service alerts. If there were to be multiple providers of dark fibre connections, this would result in disproportionate technical difficulties in the operation and maintenance of the network as the University would be required to navigate multiple alerting and monitoring systems, different account management and technical and cyber security escalation paths. Jisc provide an over-arching and integrated service for all of the University’s data connectivity. Splitting out the dark fiber contracts would result in additional complexity across technical, security, and account management functions. If there was to be a break in this service then it would impact the internet connection for the entire university through loss of resilience as well as cut service to over 2000 student bedrooms plus significant areas of the University including Western General and Easter Bush campuses plus other key buildings

Other Information

** PREVIEW NOTICE, please check Find a Tender for full details. ** The contract includes the option to extend for a further two periods of 12 months. (SC Ref:784717)