RFI ONLINE AUCTIONING SERVICES

Trade Agreement: WTO-AGP/NAFTA/AIT/Canada FTAs with
Peru/Colombia/Panama
Tendering Procedures: 
Attachment: YES (MERX) Electronic
Competitive Procurement Strategy: N/A - P&A/LOI Only
Comprehensive Land Claim Agreement: No
Nature of Requirements: 

Amendment No	Reason for amendment
 2	This amendment no 2 is raised to change  the date regarding
confirming interest for an Industry Day from October 24 to
October 31, 2013 found under (b) Objective and to correct the
contact email address. 
 1	Amendment no 1 was raised to include the RFI in its native
format in order to have access to Attachment 1: GCSurplus.ca -
Business Requirements.


1.1 OBJECTIVE, BACKGROUND OF THIS REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI)

(a) Introduction:

GCSurplus of Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC)
has a requirement for a bilingual commercially available Online
Auctioning Service (OAS) that can be readily configured and
customized to meet Canada's needs and hosted and managed by an
external third party. Canada is seeking information on current
marketplace capabilities and interest to work collaboratively
with GCSurplus to provide this transformative technology to meet
current and future functional business requirements as well as
implement new technologies to enhance the systems supporting the
GCSurplus.ca business line for the sale of Surplus Crown Assets.

This Request for Information (RFI) process is to solicit
industry opinions and feedback to help further define the
requirements as well as to understand current market capacity
and interest.

In particular, this RFI is a means of gathering information to
assist in accomplishing the following specific purposes: 

1.	To validate GCSurplus.ca functional and technical
requirements and potential upgrades against marketplace
offerings;
2.	To investigate possible approaches and techniques to meeting
current and potential future business requirements in a timely
and cost effective manner; 
3.	To determine the extent to which there exists current
capacity within the marketplace to offer a "turn-key" or
integrated solution approach to the provisioning of the
underlying systems and web-based interfaces which support the
delivery of GCSurplus.ca, providing for one (1) system / one (1)
platform; and 
4.	To determine the interest and ability of the marketplace to
work collaboratively with GCSurplus to provide access to this
solution and related services to maintain and further enhance
the GCSurplus.ca business model while leveraging shared
investments with the possibility of shared benefit.  

The information provided in response to this RFI process should
be reflective of systems, services and capabilities that are
readily available within the marketplace.  The information
provided, while incorporating any lessons learned therein, will
partly contribute to the scope and range of service offerings
sought by PWGSC in any subsequent solicitation process.


(b) Objective:

Through this RFI and any subsequent solicitation process,
GCSurplus is seeking to achieve the following business outcomes:

To achieve a modern, robust and sustainable technological
solution for the delivery of GCSurplus.ca; providing for one (1)
system / one (1) platform; 

To provide a flexible platform, that builds upon existing
solutions available in the marketplace with ideally minimal
customization or configuration to support current business as
well enable GCSurplus to respond to changes in how business is
delivered over time;

To leverage business and technological advances currently
present and emerging in the marketplace to provide a
future-oriented solution which drives efficiencies in current
business activities as well as provides for scalability to add
business functionality over time; and 

To understand and identify the extent to which capacity and
interest exists within the private sector marketplace to support
and enhance the application and infrastructure underlying
GCSurplus.ca as well as to work with GCSurplus to jointly
deliver and further develop the associated business opportunity.
The desired outcome of this work is to establish a long-term
mutually beneficial relationship (i.e. shared risk/shared
reward) with ideally one (1) best in class service provider,
which will leverage the strengths and investments of both
parties to continue to provide a quality program with a view to
minimization of cost, while maximizing best value to Canada in
the disposal of its surplus assets. A desired outcome is to
achieve an end-to-end solution that provides full audit and
reporting capability to monitor and demonstrate the attainment
of these objectives.

Through this RFI and any subsequent solicitation process, PWGSC
may wish to seek a single organization to provide some or all of
the design, delivery and maintenance aspects of its requirement
to provide the GCSurplus.ca system, as well as support future
application development needs. 

To support this goal, PWGSC may undertake a non-mandatory
industry consultation process, to seek interest, feedback and
advice from industry about capacity within the market to:

Provide the components of GCSurplus.ca which meet GCSurplus'
current business requirements and that are capable of working
with existing and emerging business processes, while also
demonstrating the ability to provide future-oriented innovation
through technology and business approaches; 
Provide transition/migration and related support services during
and subsequent to the transition to a new GCSurplus.ca system
provided by industry (e.g. hosting, application development,
disaster recovery, help desk, documentation, training, etc.); and
Work collaboratively with GCSurplus in the delivery of a robust
and forward-looking GCSurplus.ca system that promotes shared
benefit while ensuring compliance with applicable legislative,
regulatory and policy requirements and providing assurance of
public accountability.   

Attendance at the Industry Day session may be in person or via
teleconference. Interested parties are requested to confirm
their interest for an Industry Day to the PWGSC representative
identified in section 1.10 of this RFI no later than close of
business on October 31, 2013.  Information on how to participate
in any Industry Day session is provided in Attachments 2 through
5 to this RFI. If required, additional information on how to
participate in the Industry Day session will be provided through
this RFI process.


(c) Background:
GCSurplus is part of the Acquisitions Branch of Public Works and
Government Services Canada (PWGSC). GCSurplus' core functions
include the sale of federal surplus assets through its online
bidding system, GCSurplus.ca; providing strategic, procedural
and technical advice to federal government departments, agencies
and other organizations who use GCSurplus' services; supporting
government-wide consultations and related functions, including
life cycle disposal advice; supporting Treasury Board policy
development; and exploring ways and means to increase
efficiency, reduce disposal costs and maximize Canada's net
proceeds of asset sales.

The technology which supports the GCSurplus business is
currently comprised of three (3) disparate components:

GCSurplus.ca - a public facing website and functionality
associated with this system for sales of Surplus Crown Assets
(e.g. validation of customer; closed bidding; payment
remittance; etc.); 
GCSci - a client interface web portal used by Client
departments/agencies to declare and manage their surplus assets,
as well as by GCSurplus personnel to manage the surplus and sale
process from Client identification through to customer pick-up.
GCSci also supports Clients in program-level reporting and
analytical capability;
CASS 2000 - a 'back-end' database application to which the
GCapplications interface to provide for a secure common dataset
and single record of activity. CASS 2000 also supports GCSurplus
in program-level reporting and analytical capability through
custom reports.

These three (3) components are currently hosted by an external
service provider to the Government of Canada (GoC) and are
maintained and administered by GCSurplus. Application
development is currently undertaken by GCSurplus personnel.
GCSurplus also currently provides a tiered help desk with call
centre for system users (GCSurplus, Client departments/agencies,
and Customer inquiries) as well as associated user training on
these systems.

GCSurplus' systems report financial information and transaction
data (funds) to separate systems housed in PWGSC (the
Departmental Financial Information System - SIGMA - built on the
SAP platform; and the Receiver General through the Receiver
General Buy Button - RGBB). 

GCSurplus also interfaces with PWGSC's Customer Information
System (CIS) to read updated Client department/agency Customer
information (e.g. consignee code, etc.) that is subsequently
written to GCSurplus.ca through a third-party API.

Federal organizations, with a few exceptions, must use GCSurplus
to dispose of moveable (i.e. tangible) Surplus Crown Assets,
which are moveable equipment and materiel no longer required or
seized goods, ranging from ships, aircraft and cars to
furniture, tools and clothing. Through GCSurplus.ca and a small
number of contracts with service providers, GCSurplus disposes
of surplus assets through its nine (9) regional sales centres.
Client departments and organizations notify GCSurplus of their
surplus assets and GCSurplus then manages all aspects of the
asset disposal, returning the net proceeds to the client
department or organization once the items are sold. The
activities and programs of GCSurplus were previously funded via
a combination of Parliamentary Appropriation and proceeds of
sale. The business has transitioned to a funding framework based
exclusively on proceeds of sale as of April 2013.

Transformation

In support of its strategic plan to explore ways and means to
increase efficiency in its operations and maximize its revenue
potential, GCSurplus is looking to outsource the design
("configuration"), development, and operation management
(including hosting, maintenance, support, back-up, disaster
recovery and future development) of the functionality of these
systems in order to take advantage of private sector experience
and technology. For greater clarity, GCSurplus is not looking to
replicate its existing technologies or systems, but rather
looking for a market leader with existing technical capability
to support its current business operations. 

In addition to technological change, and growing the existing
customer base for GCSurplus.ca items through the provision of
further buyer-friendly system and online auctioning features,
GCSurplus is also interested in exploring the ability to offer
related new and complementary business lines through
GCSurplus.ca which could potentially include: 

(a)	Functionality to support GCSurplus in exploring
opportunities with non-federal government public sector
organizations who could benefit from access to GCSurplus.ca for
the disposal of their organization's surplus assets via sale.

(b)	Functionality to supports the transfer of assets between
federal organizations Federal organizations to promote re-use of
assets with residual value within the public sector. An asset
transfer would be at no charge to the receiving organization. 

(c)	Functionality to support the donation of surplus assets to
third parties (in accordance with policy requirements) such as
non-profit, charitable or other organizations (e.g. schools,
First Nations, etc.). A donation would be at no charge to the
recipient.


Through this process and any subsequent solicitation, GCSurplus
is seeking to establish a strategic arrangement whereby it will
be able to share the financial risks and potential benefits
associated with the expanded use of a modern and robust online
auctioning system and complementary sales marketing approaches.

At this time, it is anticipated that the scope of any future
solicitation will include provision of: 
A single integrated and modern online auctioning solution which
fulfils all of the functions required in the current
GCSurplus.ca, GCSci and CASS 2000 components; providing for one
system / one platform. This includes the ability to provide
secure data transfer of financial information and funds to
departmental systems, as well as providing access to enhanced
functions associated with modern online auctioning and potential
future innovations associated with the delivery of the solution
(e.g. real time bidding, online shipping, enhanced system
functionality and features, mobile applications, broader system
use through additional complementary applications and other
marketing measures, etc.);
A robust business intelligence, market analytic, and reporting
capability (canned / custom reports) on all aspects of the
underlying database to enable GCSurplus personnel to access key
decision-making information as well as to inform departmental
and public reporting requirements. This includes data, analytics
and reporting both on current asset disposal activities as well
as historical data retention and associated reporting capacity;
Secure off-site hosting, maintenance, application development,
and disaster recovery for the above components, including full
redundancy; and
Help desk call centre, system documentation (technical and
user), and associated system user training for the above
components.

For the purpose of this RFI, the above components are considered
to be included within the term "GCSurplus.ca". 

 

Scale of Business

GCSurplus is National in scope, encompassing GCSurplus.ca system
use from nine (9) regional sales centres.
In FY2012-2013, across all regional sales centres, approximately
$38,182,221.78 in sales was processed through GCSurplus.ca. This
figure included approximately 26,184 individual surplus asset
sales transactions as well as 43 contracts for surplus materials
sales (known as period contracts). A breakdown of these
transaction volumes by regional sales centre and type of sale or
contract is provided in Appendix B.
GCSurplus.ca is used to sell a variety of Surplus Crown Assets,
including vehicles, furniture, office equipment, technology, and
seized goods. In addition to surplus assets, GCSurplus.ca is
also used to establish period contracts for scrap and removal of
materials which maintain some residual value.
Military sales for items registered under the Controlled Goods
Program are not processed through GCSurplus.ca.

GCSurplus currently provides services to over 90 federal
department and agency Clients. There is a potential opportunity
to support an enhanced Client base within the federal arena
(e.g. special operating agencies and Crown Corporations not
currently served by GCSurplus). It is also anticipated that
other organizations from within the broader public sector (e.g.
provincial, territorial, municipal, etc.) could find the
established GCSurplus.ca model of potential benefit in the
disposal of their surplus assets. Customers for Surplus Crown
Assets are from across Canada and internationally.

Current annual operating costs for information technology
(software, hardware and infrastructure) to support the delivery
of the GCSurplus.ca business are approximately $600,000.00. As
noted previously, as of FY2013-2014, GCSurplus has moved to a
business model that is fully funded by proceeds of sale.

GCSurplus provides its services to federal organizations on a
commission-based sales model. In seeking to work collaboratively
with the private sector through a strategic arrangement, it is
anticipated that there is a potential for shared reward in
return for shared investment in the GCSurplus.ca infrastructure,
system and business supports.

Delivery Date: Above-mentioned

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

Documents may be submitted in either official language of Canada.