Tasmania has formally opened tendering to establish a whole-of-government panel of Infrastructure-as-a-Service suppliers until 31 January 2013, with an industry briefing scheduled for 18 December 2012. The panel’s establishment was initially proposed back in August, as part of the State’s Data Centre and Managed Services Strategy out to 2015.
The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) has become the latest Federal agency to enter into a ten-year data centre lease through the whole-of-government Data Centre Facilities Panel. Canberra Data Centres will provide the data centre space at a cost of $1.5 million to the agency of 700 staff.
The NSW Government will add a software-as-a-service (SaaS) module to its Procure IT Framework from February 2013 to meet demand for cloud computing, reports IT News. The introduction of infrastructure-as-a-service and platform-as-a-service modules will follow SaaS.
NSW Health has awarded a two-month $329,000 contract to Dimension Data from December 2012, to develop a data centre migration strategy for the agency’s move to one of two new data centres being built for the NSW Government by Metronode. Intermediumreported in August that an RFQ process had commenced to find a vendor to draw up the plan. The contract does not cover the actual migration of IT infrastructure, which could well be covered by a future approach to market.
DWS has received another $5.1 million from the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) for its ongoing development of the e-Tax solution throughout the 2012-13 financial year. The ATO has previously said that it intends to have a Mac-compatible version of e-Tax available in time for 2013 tax time.
A value has also become available, via AusTender, for the four year IT outsourcing contract signed with ASG which will cover services provided to the Tax Practitioners Board. The $5.6 million deal will ensure a structural separation between the operations of the independent Board and the ATO.
The NSW Department of Finance and Services (DFS) has redesigned the Government’s procurement portal with the help of Heiler Software. NSW eTendering shows that NSW Procurement (within the DFS) awarded a $5.6 million contract to the company for an “eProcurement Content Management Tool”.
Special Minister of State Gary Gray has launched a smartphone-accessible mobile version of the Australian Government Online Directory website which provides a guide to the structure and organisation, plus contact details for key people in the Australian Government. The mobile site is being maintained by the Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO).
Yarra Valley Water’s $700,000 nine-month IT in-sourcing project is being credited for a $2 million reduction in annual expenditure and steady progress towards cutting 10 per cent from its annual IT budget, reports IT News. The utility had previously outsourced IT to Fujitsu since 2005.
The WA Department of Education will deploy bring-your-own (BYO) device management capabilities, including Apple integration and increased roaming capability for schools, in its next standard operating environment (SOE), reports IT News. The Department hopes to eventually allow BYO devices to connect to school networks, and is currently conducting trials.
The eighteen-month-old Funding and Contracting Services (FaCS) unit in Government Procurement has won theWA Premier’s Award for Public Sector Excellence for Improving Government. FaCS supports the public and not-for-profit community sectors in implementing the Delivering Community Services in Partnership Policy and associated procurement reforms.
Victoria’s $99 million online education network 'Ultranet' is facing more problems, reports Fairfax, with schools refusing to use the system and complaints emerging about a security wall that hinders access to a real cyber environment.
Related Articles:
Tasmania plans for a move to the cloud
NSW Health kicks off data centre migration with RFQ
Metronode wins Bureau of Meteorology data centre lease
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