--- title: "Early Market Engagement - Enterprise Backup & Service Continuity solutions" ocid: "ocds-h6vhtk-036c44" canonical_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-036c44" markdown_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-036c44.md" json_url: "https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-036c44.json" source: "Find A Tender Service" current_stage: "Tender" buyer: "UNIVERSITY OF EXETER" published: "2022-10-10" --- # Early Market Engagement - Enterprise Backup & Service Continuity solutions Buyer: UNIVERSITY OF EXETER Current stage: Tender OCID: ocds-h6vhtk-036c44 [View canonical contract page](https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-036c44) [Download OCDS JSON](https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-036c44.json) ## Summary The University of Exeter has initiated a procurement process for "Early Market Engagement - Enterprise Backup & Service Continuity solutions" in the goods category. The University is seeking a vendor with expertise in providing similar services, and the deadline for responses has been extended to 14th October 2022. Interested parties can engage via the University's eTendering portal, with key contact details available. The procurement process is currently in the planning stage, offering potential business growth opportunities in the field of backup or recovery software solutions. This tender presents an opportunity for businesses specialising in backup or recovery software packages to partner with the University of Exeter. Interested vendors with proven experience in delivering enterprise backup and service continuity solutions are encouraged to participate. The University aims to leverage this early market engagement activity to inform its formal business case and procurement process, providing insights into market capabilities and available solutions. The call for responses includes the submission deadline of 14th October 2022 and the prospect of subsequent face-to-face discussions during October 2022, creating a conducive environment for businesses catering to disaster recovery services and data storage solutions. ## Notice The University of Exeter is looking to partner with a vendor that can provide enterprise backup and service continuity solutions with a proven background in providing services to similar institutions. ### Lot Information Lot 1 The University of Exeter is looking to partner with a vendor that can provide enterprise backup and service continuity solutions with a proven background in providing services to similar institutions. In order to understand market capabilities and the fullest spectrum of available solutions we are seeking to utilise this early market engagement activity to obtain insight from organisations with relevant solutions who could achieve our stated ambitions and have proven experience of delivering such capability. The outputs of this engagement exercise will inform our formal business case, and our ultimate procurement process in terms of route to market. Background The University of Exeter currently runs a highly available VMware vSphere environment running on a Nutanix cluster spanned across two datacentres. It currently hosts over 700 virtual machines and in excess of 200 physical servers, both Windows and Linux. Although the University currently has a cloud presence, there is no functionality in place to extend the Nutanix infrastructure into the public cloud. At present we have an active/passive deployment with no automatic failover to the secondary datacentre, should a total loss of the primary datacentre occur. We are currently constructing a business case to look at service continuity and improving our RPOs/RTOs within the IT infrastructure and how we can mitigate risks that would lead to extended periods of downtime. To do this we are looking at adding new functionality into our current infrastructure, whether it be creating a fault tolerant virtual environment with automatic failover or expanding our DR (Disaster Recovery) capabilities into the cloud. Increased protection against cyber-attacks related incidents is exceptional important nowadays as universities are getting targeted more frequently. A large part of the project is to replace our current backup products. There are currently four methods we use to back up several types of data and we are looking to consolidate these into one unified backup solution. The backup solution must be secure and immutable with an air-gapped repository. It should also be able to archive backups to public cloud storage with seamless functionality to restore directly to the VMware Environment (and Nutanix AHV in the future) or alternatively restore services into the public cloud to provide DR capability. Response to Early Market Engagement We are seeking suppliers with the relevant capability and experience to initial provide written feedback via the University of Exeter eTendering portal; https://uk.eu-supply.com/login.asp?B=EXETER by initially registering interest in this specific opportunity; UOE/2022/073/SD, and submitting your written response to the published requirements (accessible via the eTendering portal) in the form of a word or pdf file, no later than 17:00hrs on the 12th October 2022. Additional information: Attached as document ## Key Details | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Publication source | Find A Tender Service | | Latest notice | https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/028356-2022 | | Notice type | Planning Notice | | Procurement type | Standard | | Procurement category | Goods | | Procurement method | Not Specified | | Procurement method details | Not specified | | Tender suitability | Not specified | | Awardee scale | Not specified | | All stages | Planning, Tender | ## Dates | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Publication date | 10 Oct 2022 | | Submission deadline | Not specified | | Future notice date | 9 Jan 2023 | | Award date | Not specified | | Contract period | Not specified | | Recurrence | Not specified | ## Values | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Tender value | Not specified | | Lots value | Not specified | | Awards value | Not specified | | Contracts value | Not specified | ## Status | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Tender status | Planned | | Lots status | Planned | | Awards status | Not specified | | Contracts status | Not specified | ## Buyer | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Main buyer | UNIVERSITY OF EXETER | | Locality | EXETER | | Post town | Exeter | | Postcode | EX4 4QH | | Country | England | | ITL 1 | TLK South West (England) | | ITL 2 | TLK4 Devon | | ITL 3 | TLK43 Devon CC | | Local authority | Exeter | | Electoral ward | Duryard and St James | | Westminster constituency | Exeter | | Delivery location | TLK South West (England) | ## CPV Codes ### Divisions - 48 - Software package and information systems - 72 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support ### Codes - 48710000 - Backup or recovery software package - 72120000 - Hardware disaster-recovery consultancy services - 72212710 - Backup or recovery software development services - 72251000 - Disaster recovery services - 72317000 - Data storage services ## Release History - 10 Oct 2022 at 08:37 - TenderUpdate - Tender Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/028356-2022 - 28 Sep 2022 at 15:07 - Planning - Planning Notice - https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/027230-2022 ## Notice URLs - http://www.exeter.ac.uk - https://uk.eu-supply.com/app/rfq/rwlentrance_s.asp?PID=53334&B=EXETER - https://uk.eu-supply.com/ctm/Company/CompanyInformation/Index/53042 - https://uk.eu-supply.com/login.asp?B=EXETER ## Provenance This Markdown file is an alternate public rendering of the D3 Tenders contract record. The canonical page is https://d3tenders.com/contract/?ocid=ocds-h6vhtk-036c44. The underlying structured data is available as OCDS JSON at https://d3tenders.com/contract/ocds-h6vhtk-036c44.json.