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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2008-06-10 - AGENDA REPORTS - SAN SYSTEMS PURCHASE (2)Agenda Item: CITY OF SANTA CLARITA AGENDA REPORT � CONSENT CALENDAR City Manager Approval: Item to be presented by: Kevin Tonoian DATE: June 10, 2008 SUBJECT: AWARD OF CONTRACT FOR THE PURCHASE OF TWO (2) STORAGE AREA NETWORK (SAN) SYSTEMS DEPARTMENT: Administrative Services RECOMMENDED ACTION City Council award a contract in the amount of $328,645 plus a 10% contingency in the amount of $32,865 for a total amount not to exceed $361,510 to Datalink Networks for the purchase of two (2) Storage Area Network (SAN) systems, authorize the City Manager or designee to modify the award in the event other issues of impossibility of performance arise, and execute all documents, subject to City Attorney approval. + BACKGROUND The City's data storage needs have grown tremendously in the last five years to a level where a reliable, scalable, and more robust solution is required to manage the organization's network storage needs, which are necessary to support day to day operations and ensure business continuity during an emergency. The City's data is currently dispersed across several independent servers that are limited in their ability to share data efficiently. In turn, this -affects the time it takes the City to backup and restore data in the event of a system failure, site failure, or natural disaster. More importantly, there is no redundant system currently in place that staff can readily switch to in order to restore City data and seamlessly resume operations. A Storage Area Network (SAN) allows the City to efficiently centralize and manage data, dramatically improve the performance of the network, enhance security, and provide a much needed data storage redundancy solution. Furthermore, SANs are designed with disaster recovery and business continuity capabilities; thus, ultimately allowing operations to seamlessly Ar,PHOWEB continue in the event of an incident that disrupts service at the City's primary data center. The acquisition of two (2) SAN systems will address all the concerns noted above, as well as create a disaster recovery site whereby city information can be readily accessed in the event the City's primary data center is ever compromised. The primary SAN will be located at City Hall, with the second SAN identified for deployment at the City's designated Disaster Recovery Site, the Transit Maintenance Facility. The two SANS will be configured to exchange data on a daily basis so that operations can be resumed in the event data in either location is ever lost, damaged, or destroyed. In order to evaluate what SAN solution could best meet the City's needs, Technology Services staff developed and circulated an RFP in accordance with Federal guidelines and the City's Purchasing Policy. In preparing the RFP document, staff conducted extensive research to determine the most appropriate solution to meet the City's network storage needs for the next 5 to 7 years. Staff also determined that proposals obtained through a competitive process would provide the best possible pricing for ongoing system maintenance and support costs. Therefore, proposers were asked to provide the City with responses that included one, three, and five year pricing for maintenance and support services. The RFP was circulated for 30 days, with copies provided to both the Santa Clarita Chamber of Commerce and the Valley Industrial Association. Prior to the close of this process, the RFP document was downloaded by approximately 49 different agencies throughout the country, resulting in a total of four proposals that were submitted for consideration. The proposals received included the following: Vendor Product - 3 -Year Cost (taxes included) 5 -Year Cost (taxes included) Verizon Business EMC $716,133 $832,259 Datalink Networks LeftHand Networks $292,645 $328,645 FusionWare DataCore HP and DataCore $288,876 Not submitted Nexus IS E ualLogic $155,078 Not submitted City staff evaluated each proposal received utilizing the following criteria in order of importance: 1) Functionality and ability to satisfy all the goals and requirements of the RFP 2) Ease of use and ease of management 3) Thoroughness, quality, specificity, of responses to questions in the RFP 4) Disaster Recovery solution and backup strategy that meets all the goals & specifications of the City's Disaster Recovery plan 5) Scalability, expandability, and ease of upgrade 6) Total costs, including on-going maintenance and support 7) Vendor's experience, expertise, and qualifications in the area of enterprise storage and their track record in successfully implementing similar systems for other clients 8) Maintenance and support quality and features 9) References from two or more entities, preferably local, where the vendor has implemented a very similar solution During staffs initial review and evaluation, the proposal received from Verizon Business was found to be infeasible and unworkable in accomplishing the, objectives set forth in the RFP. The primary reason for this was the cost of the solution proposed, which exceeded both the City's project budget, as well as the second highest bidder by more than $400,000 for the three year cost and more than $500,000 for the five year cost. Proposals from Nexus IS, Datalink Networks, and FusionWare were evaluated by a cross-section of City staff that included raters from Technology Services and the Transit Division. Each of these proposers were also invited to provide product demonstrations of their proposed solution. Upon closer evaluation of 'the Nexus IS proposal, several critical hardware components specifically requested in the City's RFP were not included, which explains one reason for the price difference in their submitted bid. Nexus IS also did not provide a five year cost as requested. Upon conclusion of the evaluations, the solution proposed by Datalink Networks was rated the highest by the evaluation team and the best overall value to the City. In addition to scoring highest in most of the criteria evaluated, Datalink Networks also provided a five year cost proposal as requested in the RFP. The solution proposed by FusionWare was rated the lowest by the evaluation team; most notably, receiving the lowest marks for evaluation criteria #1, #2, and #3. FusionWare also did not provide a five year cost as requested. After evaluating each proposal and participating in demonstrations of each product, staff has determined the proposal from Datalink Networks is the best overall value to the City based on the requirements and evaluation criteria set forth in the RFP. ALTERNATIVE ACTIONS 1. Do not award contract 2. Other action as determined by the City Council FISCAL IMPACT Adequate funds in anticipation of this project have been previously appropriated by the City Council and are currently available in accounts 12203-5201.002 ($182,000) and F0003261 5161.001 TMF Construction ($180,000) of the Fiscal Year 2007/08 Budget.