Translation software

Trade Agreement: CETA / WTO-AGP / CPTPP / CFTA / FTAs with Peru / Colombia / Panama / Korea
Tendering Procedures: Generally only one firm has been invited to bid
Non-Competitive Procurement Strategy: Exclusive Rights
Comprehensive Land Claim Agreement: No
Vendor Name and Address: 
SYSTRAN TRANSLATION SYSTEMS   INC
PO BOX 907
7855 FAY AVE STE 300
LA JOLLA California
United States
Nature of Requirements: 

Translation software

W8474-21DS15/A
Pignat, Michael
Telephone No. - (873) 354-4163
Vendor Name and Address:
SYSTRAN TRANSLATION SYSTEMS INC.
PO BOX 907
7855 FAY AVE STE 300
LA JOLLA, California
United States


1. REQUIREMENT

National Defence has a requirement for software that will perform accurate document translations in multiple languages.  The software must reside on National Defence’s computer system.

The purpose of this Advance Contract Award Notice (ACAN) is to signal the government's intention to award a contract for this requirement to Systran Group for Systran SPNS 9 perpetual software license. Before awarding a contract, however, the government would like to provide other suppliers with the opportunity to demonstrate that they are capable of satisfying the requirements set out in this Notice, by submitting a statement of capabilities during the 15 calendar day posting period. 

If other potential suppliers submit a statement of capabilities during the 15 calendar day posting period that meet the requirements set out in the ACAN, the government will proceed to a full tendering process on either the government's electronic tendering service or through traditional means, in order to award the contract.

If no other supplier submits, on or before the closing date, a statement of capabilities meeting the requirements set out in the ACAN, a contract will be awarded to the pre-selected supplier.

2. BACKGROUND

The Department of National Defence is in the process of switching its approach from a manual process to a big-data methodology of handling documents and text files. In the past, newly received documents and text files were merely loaded or translated manually in a data repository due to inability to process large volume of files. Today, the responsibility and burden falls on the analysts to perform the translation function. To address this inefficiency and ensure that analyst time is properly utilized, an effort to automate this process is under way.  The acquisition of a translation tool will not only improve the analysts’ ability in understanding the documents, but will also save valuable time allowing them to focus on their core functions. As a result, the organization needs to acquire a translation software which accepts documents and text files from several sources, and automatically translates them as part of a new document/text reception process.

Public Services and Procurement Canada, on behalf the National Defence, intends to enter into a sole source contract with Systran Group, San Diego, California, USA the software publisher of Systran SPNS 9 for the purpose of procurement of the following:

Initial Requirement

1. Systran SPNS 9 Perpetual License by Systran with 40 languages, compute nodes, API access and 1st year maintenance
2. Training & Set-up

Optional Requirement

1. First one-year option period of software support and maintenance
2. Second one-year option period of software support and maintenance

JUSTIFICATION FOR THE PRE-SELECTED SUPPLIER

The reasons for single tendering are described in Annex A.

Section 6 of the Government Contract Regulations is being invoked in this procurement as only one person or firm is capable of performing the contract.

CFTA, Article 513, paragraph 1.(b) and 1.(c) are applicable on the basis of limited tendering due to compatibility with existing products, to recognize exclusive rights, such as exclusive licenses, copyright and patent rights, or to maintain specialized products that must be maintained by the manufacturer or its representative, and when there is an absence of competition for technical reasons and the goods or services can be supplied only by a particular supplier and no alternative or substitute exists.

Articles 1016.2(b) and 1016.2(d) of NAFTA are applicable on the basis of limited tendering due to reasons where, for works of art, or for reasons connected with the protection of patents, copyrights or other exclusive rights, or proprietary information or where there is an absence of competition for technical reasons, the goods or services can be supplied only by a particular supplier and no reasonable alternative or substitute exists, for additional deliveries by the original supplier that are intended either as replacement parts or continuing services for existing supplies, services or installations, or as the extension of existing supplies, services or installations, where a change of supplier would compel the entity to procure equipment or services not meeting requirements of inter changeability with already existing equipment or services, including software to the extent that the initial procurement of the software was covered by this Chapter.

3. PERIOD OF CONTRACT

The proposed contract is for the purchase of a software license, including support and maintenance for one year and 2 one-year option periods. 

Annex A

4. MINIMAL ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENTS

Any interested supplier must demonstrate by way of statement of capabilities that it meets all of the mandatory requirements below:

4.1 Functional Requirements
1. The translation service must translate to English from at least following 10 mandatory languages: Russian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Spanish, Hindi, French, Portuguese, Arabic, German, Urdu.
2. The translation service must translate from English to French.
3. The translation service must translate to English from at least 2 of the following 5 priority languages: Punjabi, Kurmanji, Hebrew, Farsi (Persian), and Pashto.
4. In addition to mandatory and priority languages translation software must provide additional languages so the total number of spoken population is over 5 billion.
5. The translation server must connect to the Microsoft Office 365 (Office 365 Add-in) whether it is online or on desktop applications to perform text translations from the following Office 365 applications: Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook.
6. The translation service must provide grammatically correct translations.
7. The translation service must provide contextually accurate translations.
8. The translation service must translate common expressions and phrases into something equivalent in the output language.
9. The translation service must be able to determine the language of the text based upon the text itself.
10. The translation service must accept as a parameter the output language of the translation.
11. The translation service must return one block of text with everything translated into the output language even if the source text contains many different languages.
12. The translation service must return a result with an indication of parts of the text that it could not translate or transliterate the word. Those parts that it could not understand need to be highlighted in some way, such as in quotes, and not dropped from the output text.
13. The translation service must provide the RESTFull API so the service can be invoked via a RESTful API call.
14. The translation service must receive a text JSON or XML file as input and return a text JSON or XML file as output that contains the translated text.
15. The translation service must allow the input and output text to be at least 3,000,000 characters without failing to translate due to size.
16. The translation service must include a graphical user interface (GUI) for calling the translation service from a personal computer via web browser. This interface must allow the user to drop a file, enter or copy text and have it return the results to their computer. 
17. The translation service must be able to process and translate files in the following formats: PDF, MS Office (Word, Excel, Power Point), JSON, XML.
18. The translation service GUI must allow the user to select the display language that they desire: either English or French.
19. The translation service GUI must run in a common browser such as Chrome, Firefox or Edge.
20. French centric catalog. The translation software must provide a specific French Engine that translates both to and from English.
21. The translation software must be provided with ability to train their engines themselves. 
22. Near Fuzzy Adaptation (NFA), the translation software must have a feature that will allow NFA allowing continuous engine training based on translations made.

4.2 Non-functional Requirements
23. The translation service GUI must demonstrate a record of customers with 99.9% reliability. The personal computer interface must not fail more than 0.1% of the time.
24. The translation service must run effectively in an on-premise installation.
25. The translation service must run effectively without having access to the internet. The software installed on the servers must be self-contained so that the translation is provided without internet access.
26. The translation service must be able to increase their throughput by supporting parallel processing.
27. The translation service must be able to process, on average, at least 4 million characters per minute to English and 4 million characters per minute to French. This equates to 240 MB per hour.
28. The translation service must demonstrate a record of customers with 99.99% reliability. The API must not fail more than 0.01% of the time.
29. The translation service provider must provide updated releases at least once per year and have a history of doing so over the past two years.
30. The translation software language engines must have ability to be installed on different instances and can run in parallel without incurring any additional licensing cost.
31. The translation service must run in a virtual environment on docker or one of the following operating systems:  CentOS 7.4 or later, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.1 or later, Ubuntu 12.04 or later, SUSE Linux enterprise server 12 SP3.
32. The translation software must be compatible with the organization infrastructure platform and services.
a. The translation software must utilize the neural machine translation technique and not Statistical Machine Translation techniques. 
b. The translation software must use Node.js as the web server language.
c. The translation software must contain an internal queuing software such as RabbitMQ.
33. No risk expansion the translation service. This means that as volumes grow the organization must have the ability to add additional computing power to maintain (or accelerate) the translation speed with incurring any further software license cost.
34. The translation software must be provided by a company which is well established and been operational for at least 10 years.

5. CLOSING DATE 

AND TIME FOR WRITTEN SUPPLIER RESPONSES CHALLENGING THIS REQUIREMENT IS MARCH 26, 2021 14:00.

You are hereby notified that the Government intends to solicit a bid and negotiate with one firm only as identified above.
 
If you wish to submit a written response showing that you are capable of meeting this requirement, it must be done not later than the specified closing date and time. The file number, contracting officer's name, and the closing date of the ACAN must appear on the outside of the envelope in block letters or, in the case of a facsimile transmission, on the covering page. As it is intended to proceed in a timely manner, responses received after the closing date will not be considered.

Responses received on or before the closing date will be considered solely for the purpose of deciding whether or not to conduct a competitive procurement. Information provided will be used by the Crown for technical evaluation purposes only and is not to be construed as a competitive solicitation. Your written response must provide sufficient evidence (e.g. specifications, technical data, drawings, or any other proof) that clearly demonstrates that your product or service is capable of fulfilling this requirement.

Suppliers that have submitted a response will be notified in writing of PSPC's decision to continue with the non-competitive procurement or compete the requirement.

Delivery Date: Above-mentioned

You are hereby notified that the government intends to negotiate with one firm only as identified above. Should you have any questions concerning this requirement, contact the contracting officer identified above.

An Advance Contract Award Notice (ACAN) allows departments and agencies to post a notice, for no less than fifteen (15) calendar days, indicating to the supplier community that it intends to award a good, service or construction contract to a pre-identified contractor. If no other supplier submits, on or before the closing date, a Statement of Capabilities that meets the requirements set out in the ACAN, the contracting authority may then proceed with the award.  However, should a Statement of Capabilities be found to meet the requirements set out in the ACAN, then the contracting authority will proceed to a full tendering process.

Suppliers who consider themselves fully qualified and available to provide the services/goods described herein, may submit a statement of capabilities in writing to the contact person identified in this Notice on or before the closing date of this Notice. The statement of capabilities must clearly demonstrate how the supplier meets the advertised requirements.

The PWGSC file number, the contracting officer's name and the closing date of the ACAN must appear on the outside of the envelope in block letters or, in the case of a facsimile transmission, on the covering page.

The Crown retains the right to negotiate with suppliers on any procurement.

Documents may be submitted in either official language of Canada.

Delivery Date: Above-mentioned

You are hereby notified that the government intends to negotiate with one firm only as identified above. Should you have any questions concerning this requirement, contact the contracting officer identified above.

An Advance Contract Award Notice (ACAN) allows departments and agencies to post a notice, for no less than fifteen (15) calendar days, indicating to the supplier community that it intends to award a good, service or construction contract to a pre-identified contractor. If no other supplier submits, on or before the closing date, a Statement of Capabilities that meets the requirements set out in the ACAN, the contracting authority may then proceed with the award.  However, should a Statement of Capabilities be found to meet the requirements set out in the ACAN, then the contracting authority will proceed to a full tendering process.

Suppliers who consider themselves fully qualified and available to provide the services/goods described herein, may submit a statement of capabilities in writing to the contact person identified in this Notice on or before the closing date of this Notice. The statement of capabilities must clearly demonstrate how the supplier meets the advertised requirements.

The PWGSC file number, the contracting officer's name and the closing date of the ACAN must appear on the outside of the envelope in block letters or, in the case of a facsimile transmission, on the covering page.

The Crown retains the right to negotiate with suppliers on any procurement.

Documents may be submitted in either official language of Canada.