Section one: Contracting entity
one.1) Name and addresses
NORTHERN GAS NETWORKS LIMITED
1100 Cetury Way,Thorpe Park Business Centre, Colton
LEEDS
LS158TU
Contact
Rebecca Rowley
Telephone
+44 7935077342
Country
United Kingdom
Region code
UKE42 - Leeds
Companies House
NORTHERN GAS NETWORKS LIMITED
Internet address(es)
Main address
one.6) Main activity
Production, transport and distribution of gas and heat
Section two: Object
two.1) Scope of the procurement
two.1.1) Title
Apollo Solution
two.1.2) Main CPV code
- 72000000 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support
two.1.3) Type of contract
Services
two.1.4) Short description
A contract has been awarded for a 3 year term for Apollo Solution. These services are used on all NGN laptops, tablets System Control desktops and Offtake Site Comms PCs, to enable secure remote access to NGN's IT systems. This enables widescale home-working and supports secure day to day operations for NGN's field force and system control to access NGN services to conduct their work duties.Brand provide us capabilities within its services to overcome some critical restrictions within our AWS design architecture that Amazon natively does not support from an network routing prospective.
two.1.6) Information about lots
This contract is divided into lots: No
two.2) Description
two.2.3) Place of performance
NUTS codes
- UKE42 - Leeds
two.2.4) Description of the procurement
A contract term of 3 years have been awarded for Apollo Solution. These services are used on all NGN laptops, tablets System Control desktops and Offtake Site Comms PCs, to enable secure remote access to NGN's IT systems. This enables widescale home-working and supports secure day to day operations for NGN's field force and system control to access NGN services to conduct their work duties.
Brand provide us capabilities within its services to overcome some critical restrictions within our AWS design architecture that Amazon natively does not support from an network routing prospective.
two.2.11) Information about options
Options: No
Section four. Procedure
four.1) Description
four.1.1) Type of procedure
Award of a contract without prior publication of a call for competition in the cases listed below
- The works, supplies or services can be provided only by a particular economic operator for the following reason:
- absence of competition for technical reasons
Explanation:
NGN have a contract with Brand Communications, which expires on the 31st of August 2024.
Apollo Solution services are used on all NGN laptops, tablets System Control desktops and Offtake Site Comms PCs, to enable secure remote access to NGN's IT systems. This enables widescale home-working and supports secure day to day operations for NGN's field force and system control to access NGN services to conduct their work duties.Brand provide us capabilities within its services to overcome some critical restrictions within our AWS design architecture that Amazon natively does not support from an network routing prospective. We cannot overcome this challenge without re-architecting our AWS landscape. With Brand technologies we have been able to circumvent these restrictions with their expert Layer 2 Network skills and experience. Bridging our VPC landscapes would not have been feasible without Brand technologies whilst ensuring security principles were maintained throughout the solution implemented.This is also extended into our Operational landscape where utilising the Brand Communication services, we are able to drastically improve our CNI network coverage, performance, monitoring and security of telemetry and gas day quality data flows from our critical offtake sites.
This software is a critical part of our IT infrastructure and would be a multi-million pound investment to replace, procure and swap out all devices if Brand was replaced. Therefore there is a need to renew the contract to save NGN time and money that has been spent on building our current infrastructure to replace this with a new solution.
four.1.8) Information about the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA)
The procurement is covered by the Government Procurement Agreement: No
four.2) Administrative information
four.2.1) Previous publication concerning this procedure
Notice number: 2024/S 000-025167
Section five. Award of contract
Title
Apollo Solution
A contract/lot is awarded: Yes
five.2) Award of contract
five.2.1) Date of conclusion of the contract
23 August 2024
five.2.2) Information about tenders
The contract has been awarded to a group of economic operators: No
five.2.3) Name and address of the contractor
Brand Communications Limited
Huntingdon
Country
United Kingdom
NUTS code
- UKH12 - Cambridgeshire CC
Companies House
Brand Communications Limited
The contractor is an SME
No
five.2.4) Information on value of contract/lot (excluding VAT)
Total value of the contract/lot: £335,441.95
Section six. Complementary information
six.4) Procedures for review
six.4.1) Review body
Northern Gas Networks
Leeds
Country
United Kingdom