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FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF NOVEMBER 09, 2018 FBO #6195
DOCUMENT

D -- Enterprise Cloud Fax - Attachment

Notice Date
11/7/2018
 
Notice Type
Attachment
 
NAICS
541512 — Computer Systems Design Services
 
Contracting Office
Department of Veterans Affairs;Technology Acquisition Center;23 Christopher Way;Eatontown NJ 07724
 
ZIP Code
07724
 
Solicitation Number
36C10B19Q0069
 
Response Due
12/10/2018
 
Archive Date
2/8/2019
 
Point of Contact
Kathryn Pantages
 
Small Business Set-Aside
N/A
 
Description
8 Request for Information Managed Enterprise Cloud Fax (ECFax) Service Introduction This Request for Information (RFI) is issued for information and planning purposes only and does not constitute a solicitation nor does it restrict the Government as to the ultimate acquisition approach. In accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 15.201(e), responses to this notice are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. The purpose of this RFI is to identify qualified contractors who can meet Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) requirements for a managed enterprise cloud-based faxing service. Any contract/order that might be awarded based on information received or derived from this market research will be the outcome of the competitive process. In addition, this RFI is to obtain market information on capable sources of supply, industry practices, and input specific to the information provided. The Government is not responsible for any cost incurred by industry in furnishing this information. All costs associated with responding to this RFI will be solely at the interested vendor's expense. Not responding to this RFI does not preclude participation in any future Request for Proposal (RFP), if any is issued. Any information submitted by respondents to this RFI is strictly voluntary. All submissions become Government property and will not be returned. Background The VA is in a process of migrating from the slow and costly manual/semi-automated faxing processes to an electronic faxing solutions. Across the VA multiple stove-pipe solutions exist, and additional requirements are being contracted locally, resulting in inefficient implementation and sustainment costs. The Federal Government s drive towards cloud first and cloud smart strategies represents a critical opportunity to improve and simplify a vital VA communications requirement while simultaneously reducing the physical footprint and capital expenditures to the VA. At this time, there are multiple faxing vendor services locally configured and implemented across the VA. A centralized managed cloud hosted faxing service will allow for increased efficiency and security, thus decreasing the time and cost associated with VA staff manually processing documents and support new operational requirements. Scope of Work The contractor shall provide and maintain a fully managed Enterprise Cloud Fax (ECFax) solution capable of supporting VA s enterprise-wide requirements for a full-service provider to implement and manage a Commercial-Off-the-Shelf (COTS) cloud-based, scalable secure digital fax/data transfer service. The application shall be fully or partly hosted within one of the VA s existing cloud providers (AWS and Azure) or in a vendor Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) certified facility. For the purposes of this RFI a fax is a single transmission session that may consist of multiple pages with a cover page The managed ECFax service shall provide VA with the ability to send and receive secure fax documents electronically, exponentially improving the security and efficiency of VA faxing services. The ECFax service shall provide a centralized ECFAX management system to replace multiple local implementations and configurations. VA sites requiring a managed ECFAX service shall be able to connect to the cloud-based system, streamlining the request process, and reducing the implementation timeline. Sites with existing faxing services will migrate to the managed ECFax service with support from the ECFax provider. Outside parties (Veteran or other stakeholders) shall have the ability to sendsecure faxes to the managed ECFax service to capture and route to the correct VA office, process, or staff member. Similarly, VA shall have the ability to send outbound faxes without the need to print, timestamp, and scan prior documents prior to sending. This shall include the capture and transmission of data from various VA health applications such as Veterans Health Information System and Technology Architecture (VistA), Computerized Patient Record System (CPRS), and the future Electronic Health Record system provided by Cerner Corporation via the use of Application Programming Interface (APIs). The contractor shall provide the managed infrastructure services on a 24 hour per day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year basis. The VA s faxing solution(s) currently operate on multiple different platforms with a wide array of capabilities and various levels of business process integration. The scope of this effort shall provide a managed cloud hosted faxing service that meet the collective needs of all VA administrations and offices across the VA. VA s goal is to transition all its faxing solutions to the managed ECFax service within five (5) years after award of the base contract. The current faxing services environment is highly diversified, from small, medium, and large geographically redundant enterprise-level faxing solutions supporting all VA administrations and business offices. Transition of existing faxing services shall be in a phased approach, beginning with a small facility/organization up to and including whole administrations dependent on vendor capabilities. As new faxing requirements are requested, the contractor shall implement these new requirements through the managed ECFax service simultaneous with ongoing migration activities. Under the managed ECFax services described within this RFI, the entire solution (or portions described below) would be entirely owned by the provider including the application infrastructure, code updates, management, change, and other necessary practices with the exception of the data. If the VA-managed cloud services are utilized to support this managed ECFax service, the contractor shall meet all VA s current technical, operational, and security requirements. The Government would engage services strictly through outcome based Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and rendering of business capabilities presented to the provider. The contractor shall provide all management, transportation, equipment, tools, materials, service related equipment (SRE), supplies, installation, supervision, engineering, maintenance, testing, and services necessary to make the circuits, services, functionality, and features fully operational and perform all the tasks associated with providing an enterprise-wide managed cloud faxing service. The managed ECFax service shall include ongoing responsibility for 24-hour monitoring, managing and/or problem resolution. The contractor shall be bound by the SLAs that state the performance and quality metrics of their relationship. The managed ECFax service shall be capable of supporting transition of the entire VA enterprise. Managed Enterprise Cloud Fax Capabilities shall include but are not limited to: Criterion General Capabilities Fax Sending (from VA outbound) Faxes can be sent using a variety of platforms, including multifunctional devices, email, desktop print-to-fax functionality, mobile devices and web service APIs supporting high-volume business processes. This includes screen/document captures. Fax Receiving (from VA inbound) Faxes can be received via email address, distribution lists, and network folders, Multi-Functional Device (MFD) or a plain  fax machine, or can be routed and printed on specific devices. Solutions should offer the ability for faxes to be received, parsed and routed dynamically via bar codes or other identifiable content. Integrations Support Integrations with core business applications, vertical-specific solutions, and document management solutions as well as integrations with email systems. May include legacy platforms, such as midrange and mainframe computers. Possible integrations protocols may include but are not limited to: C++,.NET, Java, Perl and Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP), and Python, as well as legacy APIs such as Component Object Model (COM) and Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). Vendor must be capable of analyzing and providing this support to meet specific business requirements. Central Administration Administration interfaces for use around common tasks; for example, scheduling faxes, managing templates, accessing and searching archives, and managing user access and user organizational hierarchies. Capable of supporting granular chargebacks by a user or department, and of administration for the addition and removal of phone access numbers and reporting. Reporting, Logging and Auditing Centralized dashboard type capability to produce reports on how transactions are processed to include but not limited to the source, destination, times, status, length and file type for each inbound and outbound transaction. System access and updating. Regulatory Compliance Compliance with Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), as well as Payment Card Industry (PCI), PCI Data Security Standard (DSS), International Standard on Assurance Engagements (SAE)3402, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA), Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) compliance and eSignature capabilities. For Non-US. customers compliance with the Singapore Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA), EU Directive 95/46/EC or the German Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG). Compliance with U.S.-EU Safe Harbor and the U.S.-Switzerland Safe Harbor guidelines. Disaster Recovery/Continuity of Operations Provide sufficient redundant capability to recover from loss of access, communications, networking or cloud hosted applications. End User Training Provide Training for Supervisor and Agent application users, Virtual Training and Training videos available for AdHoc Training. Training for VA administrators. Scalability Initial support for up to 500,000 faxed documents a month scalable with potential requirements of up to 1,000,000 a month (estimated). Vendor Questions VA seeks to understand the following in your response: Describe your current solution Architecture and how it compares to the functional requirements noted in this RFI. List all technical and security standards your solution employs. Provide a summary of your technical capability and expertise to execute Agile project management methodologies to meet the requirements. If appropriate, explain why Agile project methodologies should not be applied to contract execution. Can your solution be integrated into a VA Government Cloud environment (currently AWS and Azure)? See Attachment A for the VA Enterprise Cloud (VAEC) Technical Reference Guide What information is required from the VA to implement the solution within one of the VA Cloud providers (AWS, Azure) and at various VA sites. If you currently have a commercial cloud hosted ECFax capability is it certified at FEDRAMP High? If not, what would it take to do so and when could this be done? Does your product store and transmit sensitive information using security mechanisms that meet Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 criteria? Describe the overall security features of your solution in relationship to this RFI. Discuss details on how data is protected in transit and at rest, and from any cyber vulnerability or attacks, such as Denial of Service (DoS) attacks, malware, spoofing, spams, and viruses. Describe your ability to temporally store faxed documents in the event of failure of transmission or receiving due to operational system issues. Describe the disaster recovery/system failure capabilities of your solution. Does your solution integrate with email applications such as Outlook right out of the box? If so, which applications and versions. Are their additional software requirements to implement the solution across VA including augmentations that may be required for currently existing multifunctional devices (fax, printer, scanner)? Include a vendor list of devices not requiring changes as applicable. Is the solution "agentless" or will it require an agent to be installed on each endpoint device? i.e., a desktop application. Define the scalability of your solution. What are the minimums and maximums your ECFax solution. Minimum VA requirements are for up 500,000 fax transmissions (can consist of multiple pages in each transmission) per month during initial operational capability. Has your product been certified as 508 Compliant by a Government Agency, or a commercial vendor? If so, please provide the Agency/vendor, Agency/vendor Point of Contact (POC), and date of the certification. Are the certifications test results releasable to VA? Is a Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) available? Does your product support Two Factor Authentication (2FA), including compatibility with Personal Identification Verification (PIV) authentication? If not, would significant development be needed to make it 2FA compliant? Define the minimum system requirements or hardware specification for the implementation and hosting of your product to fulfill business, security, reporting, performance, and capacity in a potential VA cloud hosted environment. Describe your solutions ability to integrate with the types of systems as noted in this RFI, (VisTA, CPRS, Cerner) at a minimum using various interface protocols to include APIs. Describe the processes and services you can provide under your managed service solution. Include who you have implemented such with and the size of the implementation related to the size of the VA. Has your commercial solution ever received an Authority to Operate (ATO) from any Government Agency and which agency? Describe your solutions administration, reporting, and overall management capability. Are you willing to support and implement an evaluation solution ECFax service internal to the VA for up to 180 days pilot program to assess ease-of-implementation, scalability, performance, application high availability of the proposed solution? What would you consider to be the most difficult technical, operational, or management challenge for a solution of this scope. Are any of the technical requirements or features listed in the RFI not typical of an industry standard stack for a managed service contact center with toll free services? If so, which ones? Are there any typical industry features that are missing? Recommended Service Level metrics, targets and measurement windows for the following Performance Metrics: Availability (Service) (Av(S), Service Requests, Change Request, Event Notification-Service Availability Impacting, Event Notification-Security Breach (as defined by National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) guidelines), Response Time-Service Availability Impacting. Provide additional Performance Metrics (if any) that are standard components of your service offering. Proposed standard transition/implementation timelines: address an implementation timeline of 90 days for an operational platform and six (6) months for initial migration to the managed ECFax service. What would be the risks? Provide standard timelines and activities for implementation of this service (based on establishing this service at a client of similar scope and volume). Provide three (3) case studies (no more than one (1) page each), that describe how you have provided or currently provide this solution to an organization of similar scope, size and complexity to the VA. Provide a list of the number of clients that you have successfully implemented and supported as a prime contractor. The client s scope, size, complexity, and contact volume must be similar to the VA. Additional information such as capacity, number of business processes supported, and geographical scope should be included, as available. What are your company s processes to satisfy the requirements for adherence to schedule, agility, flexibility, responsiveness, scalability and reliability, service quality and consistency, and continuous improvement? Provide a rough projected costing model for your solution. What pricing models for a cloud hosted managed service solution would you provide and why should the VA consider it. Annualized estimate of the cost for a five (5)-year term assuming VA hosts the solution within its Enterprise cloud solutions (AWS or azure) or your FedRAMP High capable facility. The following can be assumed: Initial operational capability of 500,000 fax transmissions a month. Managed Services annualize costs over five (5) years related to implementing and managing this service: Licenses or subscriptions fee. Software maintenance (patches, upgrades etc.). Implementation support Planning and execution (including site surveys and training). Non-recurring Software development. Operations and management of the solution for up to a potential of 1700 VA sites with various business models. Cloud hosting fees. RFI Response Instructions NOTE: The capability package must be clear, concise, and complete. VA is under no obligation to provide feedback to the company, or to contact the company for clarification of any information submitted in response to this RFI. VA reserves the right to not respond to any or all emails or materials submitted. All VA current requirements identified herein are subject to change at any time. Provide the additional following information in your response: Provide Company Information: Company Name CAGE/DUNS Number under which the company is registered in SAM/VetBiz.gov Company Address Point of contact name Telephone number Email address For Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SDVOSB)/Veteran Owned Small Business (VOSB) concerns, indicate whether at least 50 percent of the cost of performance incurred is planned to be expended for employees of your concern or employees of other eligible SDVOSB/VOSB concerns. Provide a detailed description of the 50% or more of the service the SDVOSB/VOSB will be providing plus a detailed description of the services provided by non-SDVOSB/VOSB s. What contract vehicles do you have available to provide this managed service? Describe any applicable schedules (General Services Administration (GSA), Mission Oriented Business Integrated Services (MOBIS), Veterans Technology Services (VETS) Government wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC), etc.); Do you plan to be a Prime or subcontractor? Can your company independently provide the entire range of requirements? If not, which requirements cannot be met and describe teaming arrangement to meet all the requirements. Describe which tasks will be provided by each team in terms of percentage of work. The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code applicable to this acquisition is 541512. Please indicate your company size and socio-economic status under this NAICS as part of your response. All proprietary/company confidential material shall be clearly marked on every page that contains such. Include the name, email address and phone number of the appropriate representative of your company. Submit responses to this RFI by email to Kathryn Pantages, Contract Specialist at kathryn.pantages@va.gov. Please note RFI TAC-19-52602 ECFax Service in the subject line of your response. Please limit responses to no more than 15 pages. Submit your response by 11:00AM (EST) on December 10, 2018.
 
Web Link
FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/notices/b9c57c5bdef4e590a646bc6e22b86f69)
 
Document(s)
Attachment
 
File Name: 36C10B19Q0069 36C10B19Q0069.docx (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=4672892&FileName=36C10B19Q0069-000.docx)
Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=4672892&FileName=36C10B19Q0069-000.docx

 
File Name: 36C10B19Q0069 VAEC Technical Reference Guide.pdf (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=4672893&FileName=36C10B19Q0069-001.pdf)
Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=4672893&FileName=36C10B19Q0069-001.pdf

 
Note: If links are broken, refer to Point of Contact above or contact the FBO Help Desk at 877-472-3779.
 
Record
SN05145714-W 20181109/181107230526-b9c57c5bdef4e590a646bc6e22b86f69 (fbodaily.com)
 
Source
FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)

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