ICT Marketplace briefing

Last week, NZTech, NZRise and IITP welcomed members to a briefing from the GCIO’s office on the ICT Marketplace designed for the New Zealand Government to procure cloud services.  DIA’s, Government ICT Supply Strategy Manager, Ron Stuart, briefed over 200 members at events in Auckland and Wellington.

The Government’s ICT Strategy (2015) noted the accelerated pace of disruptive change and a key initiative included the establishment of an “ICT Marketplace” to enable government agencies to access a wider range of public cloud services.  The New Zealand ICT Marketplace will be modelled on the experiences learned from similar platforms in other countries including the G-Cloud in the United Kingdom.

The ICT Marketplace has the potential to improve the efficiency of procurement practices. It will enable agencies to access innovative ICT services quickly, provide competition, reduce procurement costs and timeframes with the government to be treated as a single customer.

As discussed in Ron Stuart’s briefing, the ICT Marketplace will be a public cloud software marketplace, not hybrid or private cloud.  For an organisation to list their software there will be a single contract negotiation which will include security clearance and pricing for the government to procure licenses.

The DIA are currently in Proof of Concept projects with two vendors whose names were not disclosed.  At the conclusion of these projects the market will be engaged for procurement.

Going forward, NZTech, NZRise and IITP will continue to meet the GCIO’s office on a quarterly basis with a view to further discussions and additional briefings to explore how the marketplace will operate equitably.