Short Description:
The District of Columbia Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department (DC-FEMS) intends to install mobile gateways on first responder vehicles.
Complete Description:
Introduction
The District of Columbia Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department (DC-FEMS) intends to install mobile gateways on first responder vehicles. These mobile gateways will connect to the Internet through District secure terrestrial Wi-Fi and through cellular broadband modems from AT&T and Verizon on the donor side while serving as an access point to establish a mobile hotspot providing local client side broadband connectivity. The mobile gateways provide a vehicle based demarcation that consolidates backhaul connectivity on one side while sharing access with a multitude of local devices on the other. This represents a departure from having dedicated and independent backhaul resources for each local device or application. The goal of this consolidation is to reduce recurring backhaul expenditures while enhancing connectivity and ease of access for local mobile data intensive applications and devices. The mobile gateway will also provide gateway based services such as RFID tag based asset tracking, vehicle diagnostics telemetry and fleet management. The contract will include implementation for a minimum of 50 vehicles and include an Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) of additional vehicles.
Statement of Work
DC Fire and EMS (FEMS) Information Technology (IT) Department seeks a contractor to provide program management, system design, system integration and oversight of system implementation services in support of this effort. While the integration of the Gateway is highly customized to support the applications and devices of the FEMS fleet of vehicles, the success of the integration is also highly dependent on the quality of the integration. A simple installation of Gateway hardware will not result in a successful integration.
The bidder must already possess an intimate knowledge on existing FEMS systems, apparatus, functions, and equipment, in depth knowledge of FEMS IT policies and procedures regarding wireless data systems particularly in regard to security and established relationships with FEMS interagency partners such as the Office of Unified Communications and the Office of the Chief Technology Officer, and have time immediately available to begin working on the integration.
The Technical Program Manager will need working knowledge of commercial broadband services, commercial coverage aggregation, mobile WiFi hotspot implementation, traffic engineering, vehicle diagnostics telemetry, network management, remote mass configuration, remote troubleshooting and over-the-air updates. Additional knowledge required includes 801.1x /RADIUS authentication, RFID tags for asset tracking and fleet management applications.
The Technical Program Manager will play a crucial role during the implementation phase as well where care must be taken to minimize the impact of installations and testing on fleet availability. The ideal Program Manager’s system design and system integration efforts followed by system testing will result in the definition of a mature system architecture and configuration that can be dependably installed and fully commissioned with a single touch of the vehicles. There are four phases to the program:
1. Program Management
o Conducting weekly conference calls to update status
o Providing weekly status updates
o Development of an RFP for installation services during implementation
2. System Design
o Develop pipe analysis plan and design concept for hardware
o Develop guidelines and get approval for gateway architecture and configuration
o Develop a Security Plan
o Develop a System Test Plan
3. System Integration
o District IT network
o Backhaul options
o Web portal for gateway monitoring and management
o District terrestrial secure Wi-Fi networks
o Vehicle local devices and applications
4. System Implementation
o Develop installation guidelines
o Develop Vehicle Acceptance Test Procedures
o Manage, track and report installation progress
o Training
o Provide ongoing 24/7 technical support for a year with option for an additional year
Project Deliverables
• Weekly Status Reports
• RFP for installation services
• Pipe Analysis and Design Concept
• Proposed Gateway Architecture and Configuration
• Security Plan
• System Test Plan
• System Integration Report
• Final Gateway Architecture and Configuration
• Installation Guidelines
• Vehicle Acceptance Test Procedures
• Service Level Agreement for extended technical support
Skills:
Skill
Required / Desired
Amount
of Experience
Expertise Rating
Senior Project Management
Required
15
Years
3 - Expert
Wireless data connectivity and networking
Required
10
Years
3 - Expert
Ability to create in depth test plan with highly technical specifications (coverage in parts of the city, network meshing, signal strength, etc...)
Required
10
Years
3 - Expert
Ability to juggle an upgrade schedule that involves apparatus that is currently in use and can only experience minimum downtime.
Required
10
Years
3 - Expert
Master's Degree
Required
Questions:
Please outline your wireless networking experience.
Please describe what wireless protocols you have experience with.
What was the most costly project you managed and how long did it take?
What is your experience training average users in new complicated technology?
How would you mitigate ensuring up time of 99.99%