By Tim Ferguson, 22 October 2007 15:58
NEWS
Eight companies are in the running as key suppliers for the Identity and Passport Service's (IPS) National Identity Scheme.
The companies named as potential suppliers for the scheme - which includes the national ID cards programme - are Accenture, BAE Systems, CSC, EDS, Fujitsu, IBM, Steria and Thales.
The original procurement notice was posted on the European OJEU (Official Journal of the European Union) website in August and a bidders conference was held in September where interested parties could find out more about the procurement process.
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The IPS received 11 pre-qualification questionnaire responses following the bidders conference, with eight companies now being invited to take part in a competitive dialogue with the IPS over the next few months - before final tenders are made.
Bill Crothers, commercial director of the IPS, said the service now has a solid core of eight 'prime bidders' and is pleased with the level of interest shown.
He added the IPS will be in constant contact with the eight bidders to outline detailed plans and listen to supplier views before making a decision.
Suppliers will be required to design, build, deploy and service various projects - including an overhaul of the Immigration and Asylum Fingerprint System - as well as offer business process and IT outsourcing.
The IPS predicts total spending on these procurement contracts will be around £2bn - a significant chunk of the project's £5.5bn total budget.
The IPS aims to have five prime suppliers in place by May 2008.
Comments
There are 4 comments. Join the discussion
1. Karen Challinor
"The IPS aims to have five prime suppliers in place by May 2008"
Six months is a long time in politics, we could have had an election by then and all this effort will be down the drain if Labour don't win
2. GALLEY SLAVE#41
Well that's ok, now we know who the weakest link in the system is likely to be.
3. Karen Challinor
apparently fingerprint recognition isn't going to be used in the house of commons as their security guys have decided against it on the following grounds
1 - the scanners are unreliable
2 - the scanners don't handle sweat or dirt on fingers very well .. well these are politicians who knows where their hands have been
3 - certain unnamed ethnic groups have problems with the scanners
4 - they don't want anyone hacking the fingers off a politician to gain access to the house
but it's going to be fine to use to get your money out of a late night cashpoint isn't it, or access that government building you work in or start your car or log in to your PC... no one would want to hack your finger of to get at any of that would they ? noooo course not it's just politicians that it won't be any good for
4. anonymous
Well lets hope they get their fingers burnt or did I mean cut off?