Development of Energy Customer Database (ECD) and beta Secure Data Exchange (SDE)

Tender description

Why the Work is Being Done We see this as a real way of driving better customer engagement with the energy industry. The purpose of the engagement is the following: LOT A) Develop a beta of the SDE to enable industry to share data with Ofgem in a secure, scalable manner as part of Ofgem’s wider data service; LOT B) Create a secure, scalable cloud based ECD with the option of an associated customer facing website. Problem to Be Solved We need delivery partner(s), A) To develop a beta of the Secure Data Exchange and B) To create the disengaged customer database service in order to setup and run services to prompt customer engagement. Key areas will include: • Secure, scalable file transfer from industry participants through SFTP (as the SDE MVP); • A secure, scalable cloud based database built along micro service with orchestration, elasticity, self-provisioning and to established Security standards (e.g. NCSC, OWASP); • Alignment with the current data service Enterprise Data Hub Prospective bidders will be able to bid for either or both strands A and B. Who Are the Users Energy customer – We need to make it as simple as possible for them to use the service and switch supplier – strip out complexity; Energy supplier – They will need to give us accurate data (as specified by Ofgem) in a timely, secure fashion. They need to be able to update the data regularly and receive feedback on the data transferred; Ofgem team – Through analytics and reports from the database, iterate the service design to improve effectiveness; plan further services. Early Market Engagement N/A Work Already Done SDE is at an alpha stage built in Azure and uses Hadoop. Ingested artefacts are available in a spark cluster which run different jobs written in Python. The data store for the spark cluster is Hive. There's an ingestion unit which should accept multiple protocols. The ECD is in alpha stage and uses AWS. Environments are provisioned using Terraform. There has been work done on defining data schemas. Test environment implemented so far. Creates database and populates it with dummy data in a simple table. Configuration work using GoCD server. Existing Team Ofgem Product Owner; Ofgem User Researcher (part time); Business Analyst; Delivery Manager. Current Phase Alpha Work Location Ofgem: 10 South Colonnade, Canary Wharf, E14 4PU, London Working Arrangments We expect the digital delivery team to be co-located with the Ofgem staff at 10 South Colonnade, Canary Wharf. We expect to co-source the digital delivery team and from September will have some Ofgem resource (BA, user researcher) made available to us. We will seek to integrate these into the team as and when they become available and so flexibility to ramp up or down is important to us. We take an agile, user-centred design approach and so any development work must be flexible enough to respond to changing information and needs, as our research develops. Security Clearance Baseline Personnel Security Standard clearance required. Additional T&Cs Ofgem shall have the right to terminate the Contract at any time, by giving 4 weeks written notice to the Supplier, and Ofgem’s liability thereto shall be for costs reasonably incurred by the Supplier up until the termination date. Suppliers must confirm acceptance of this term. All title to and all rights and interest in the IPR’s in the Services delivered by the Supplier for the Customer under this Call-Off Contract (or by a third party on behalf of the Supplier), and all updates and amendments of these items, shall vest in the Customer. Skills & Experience Have delivered digital services using a multidisciplinary agile team; Have delivered digital services using agile techniques (as in GDS Service Manual), that meet GDS Service Standards; Have experience of developing and deploying cloud based technical architecture for secure large scale databases built along micro services; Demonstrate understanding of GDPR; Have experience of setting up and use of analytics to inform service development and iterative design of services; show their experience of collaborating with teams as they develop new operational processes to transition to a business as usual state; Be willing to co-source with Ofgem; Able to ramp number of contractors up or down based on Ofgem’s requirements; Demonstrate experience of delivering high volume digital services for HM Government; Nice to Haves Demonstrate Energy market experience. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria Proposed agile delivery approach, methodology and timescales, including team availability and responsiveness to deliver a digital service Experience of designing and deploying infrastructure as code in cloud based environments for digital services Identification of risks, dependencies, and offered approaches to manage them Project team structure (with roles and responsibilities) Skills and experience of the team Value for money Cultural Fit Criteria Demonstrate your approach to engaging with suppliers who will be legally required to provide data Demonstrate how you will work transparently, collaboratively as an integrated team Demonstrate how you will take responsibility to challenge the status quo and stand up for your discipline whilst involving staff Evidence of working with a government organisation Evidence of working with clients with different levels of technical expertise Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method Written proposal Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 20% Price 20% Questions from Suppliers Budget range £1.5 million – £1.7 million in total. breakdown below: lot a (sde) circa.£600k - £700k; lot b (ecd) circa.£900k-£1 million.