Component 1.2: Institutionalizing e-GP

1. 
   Limited e-GP system operational framework within the government structure whereas the e-GP function is a business function to manage and operate as a professional data center that requires full autonomy in terms of its legal and financial structure operating under commercial law.
   

2. 
   Long term hierarchic structure for decision making negatively impacting upon resolving issues related with the technology investment, resource allocations, hiring people; developing standard technical procedures and guidelines for managing the e-GP platform efficiently& effectively.
   

3. 
   Inadequate staffing with skilled IT professionals that are required to follow technology architecture & processes for ensuring smooth operations and cyber security of the e-GP system.
   

4. 
   Issues relating to the need for appropriate business continuity plan, back up procedures, security policies recovery policies adhering to IT security compliance, functional surveillance of operation and maintenance, IT Risk mitigation, performance measurement, and value creations for all the procurement entities.
   
5. 
   Inadequate capacity of existing infrastructure/data center compared with the rapidly changing e-GP growth with short, medium, and long term plans.
   

1. 
   The e-GP service provider will be responsible for the on-going operation and development of the e-GP system infrastructure supporting GoB’s procurement reform programs. It will be responsible for the on-going maintenance and enhancements of the system to ensure the system supports to governments on-going business needs. All data created by and collected on behalf of the government will remain government property.
   

2. 
   It will operate through a contractual agreement with the government (CPTU/Authority) to ensure the services levels and business and support requirements continue to be achieved. The CPTU will retain full ownership of all data created and collected in the e-GP system.
   

3. 
   Under the contractual relationship, any changes to the underlying e-GP system and any new features added to the government version of the system must be approved and accepted by the government. The Government will need to have policies, practices and resources to properly oversee the operation and delivery of the service provider including tools and practices for performance and security monitoring. Robust policies and guidelines will be in place to describe how source code may be released to system modifiers without breaching the integrity of the system and without encroaching on the intellectual property rights of the CPTU to this resource.
   

4. 
   In addition to the e-GP system, the service provider will provide services and system develop support as needed for other IT development needs of the CPTU/Authority including but not limited to support for citizen engagement services, open contracting, web portal services and leveraging social media in the delivery and access to e-GP data.
   

13. The project would provide legal and financial management support to review the business model, governing policies and systems to ensure the proper legal construct, policies, human resource, and financial management systems are in place to support and protect the operation of the service provider.

1. 
   The e-GP business operation is expected to generate $10 million per year over a period of five years through the processing of thousands of system transactions, vendor registrations, training services and support. Strong financial management practices and supporting financial control systems will be required to ensure successful operation of the business.
   

2. 
   The service provider will have necessary human resources covering management and high level IT professionals as well as process and policy analysis in place. IT professional will cover e-GP Application Administrator, Database Administrator, System Administrator, Call Center Manager and other key officials. Process and policy analysis will cover business continuity plan, back up policy and procedures, information security policy, recovery policy, network management process, system management process, database management process, and application management process.
   

3. 
   The planned expansion to all agencies will create expanded human resources demands and system capacity demands. Support will be needed to ensure the necessary resources – human and system – are in place to sustain ongoing growth. CPTU, where feasible, should leverage resources and existing support infrastructure developed within the initial 4 target agencies to facilitate training and activities and to serve as examples in expanding to next to 28 organizations. For example, LGED is expected to serve as the main technical service providers to support the local government institutions/organizations related entities (about 888) under the Local Government Divisions.
   

4. 
   From 2017-2020, CPTU forecasts growth in registered bidders from 22,000 to 120,000. This would represent about 120 new vendor registrations per day or a minimum of six full-time resources to process the registrations alone. CPTU may need to re-examine some current processes, such as vendor registration, to determine how they can be streamlined to minimize any potential delays or bottlenecks in order to achieve projected targets. Investment could be made to leverage existing relationships with banks and agencies to facilitate this process. Current registration process requires submission and verification of physical documents, the verification should become electronic as much as possible including linking with other government systems to validate information.
   

5. 
   The growth forecast of expanding to all agencies will require significant expansion of the system technology hardware, software and network infrastructure to support the anticipated user and transactional demands applied to the system. Training facilities and support services will also require expansion to accommodate the needed e-GP training in an expedited timeframe and, where feasible, incorporate e-training and e-support to alleviate demand on human resources.
   

1. 
   Needs of all new organizations in terms of hardware, software, human resources, consultancies will be covered under the expansion program. Also, the creation of specific procurement technical support unit within the key agencies will be included.
   

2. 
   Exploring the incorporation of bidders’ self-evaluation in the automated e-GP system against the evaluation criteria of the bidding document. Also, the possibility of submitting bid securing declaration by the bidder instead of bid security will be actively considered in light of the fact that bid security became redundant under e-GP as all the bidders are registered, and rate of forfeiture of bid security is extremely rare. This will leverage more participation of bidders.
   

3. 
   Operation and security functions would apply across all system platforms. The system would look at monitoring tools to notify management of any potential risk to a procurement – single bidder, no bidder, delays, collusions, inadequate competition, disqualification of ranked bidder.
   

4. 
   Updating of e-GP modules with security coding features of the existing workflows for registrations, document validation and payments to be conducted to minimize any potential bottlenecks that may affect the procurement process with the increased volume of transactions. Also, the security and risk management in application and database at its highest level will be established. Support for new web browsers (Microsoft edge and google chrome) and latest version of approved browsers (Internet Explorer and Firefox) to be included. Reviewing the data collected in the system to support the future data analytics and reporting requirements of the PE’s, and the Authority.
   

5. 
   New procurement functionalities and enhancements to system functions are required to extend the system value of all stakeholders purchasing/catalogues, e-purchasing, product coding/economic classifications, reverse auctions, framework agreements, expanded contract management, asset management support, payments services and red flag monitoring, and reporting tools. New procurement workflows be included such as single stage two-envelop for goods and works for ADB and other donor projects. Also, the registration process of foreign bidders to be streamlined to remove the need for submission of physical documents. Advance Search functions to include Donor and funding source options, and notification services as new opportunities.
   

6. 
   New performance management features to provide quarterly reporting to CPTU and other government agencies on performance indicators relating to the efficiency and effectiveness of the procurement process and the value for money obtained through the process. Performance monitoring reports will be defined in multiple formats to enable use of the information for agencies responsible for implementation as well as those responsible for oversight and monitoring.
   

7. 
   Publication in open data formats will be enabled by the introduction of an Application Programming Interface that follows the schema of the Open Contracting Data Standard (OCDS) as a new feature of the system. The e-GP will make its data available for other systems to consume in a machine readable format. An API will enable an automatic integration between the systems with minimal efforts. The public data can be shared between systems through a public API, the private data can be shared through a private API that requires authentication. Extensive documentation on how to structure data after OCDS is already publicly available. A study needs to be completed to evaluate how other systems are publishing their data and to provide recommendation for advanced integrations that respect the best practices in terms of online security.
   

8. 
   Examination of new technology in the e-GP process – mobile, geo-tagging, video, social media, interactive dashboard, discussion board – will be explored to further engage stakeholders and create public awareness of government procurement and project implementation to enhance the e-GP service offering. Support production and hosting of seminars and workshops to introduce e-GP and recruit new agencies and bidders to the system, helping to ensure system expansion across Bangladesh.
   

9. 
   Integration with other Bangladesh e-Government systems will be required to facilitate data exchange and verification, specifically with the smart national identity card for personal profile verification of users, integrating with electronic tax systems, IBAS⁺⁺ systems, streamline the registration process and document validation, program evaluation and monitoring. Also, integration with budgetary system will be explored. The integration or functional interoperability will be rolled in phased approach so that it add the value rather dysfunctional integration.
   

10. 
    The business development initiatives will focus on continued growth of the vendor marketplace, support citizen engagement in the procurement process, and ensure all target users/stakeholders have an awareness and understanding of the value of the e-GP system and their role in the procurement and monitoring process.
    

11. 
    Revenue models will be needed to ensure ongoing system growth and full participation of all government agencies in using the system. The system’s value is in the content created and managed by the agencies; thus, it is important that the business model ensures their full participation. In future, explore options, if feasible, to allow private sector conduct procurement keeping data separate.
    

12. 
    For the new data center, there will be a MOU between CPTU and Bangladesh Computer Council who agreed to provide physical housing of the e-GP data center (main server) including security, power, environment/cooling, space, and risk management. Further to this Datacenter vendor will impart their contractual obligation as current agreement and SLA.
    

13. 
    New systems will be developed in support of other components of DIMAPPP including but not limited to citizen engagement, open contracting, performance management, procurement professionals’ certification program, and project implementation and capacity development initiatives. Each of the new systems will have a need or effect for the information collected in the e-GP system. As the custodian of the government e-GP data, the e-GP corporate, if established, will need to minimize any overlapping or duplication of any procurement data collected or maintained in different systems and to serve as a central link to all procurement information available.