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Hello FirstNet fans! Guess what, a precursor to the dreaded FirstNet RFP! In case you didn’t see it, the state of New Hampshire issued a FirstNet RFP, (Request for Proposal) for a FirstNet system. The PDF link is here for all of you to see and yes, it is publicly viewable. UrgentComm did a story on this here. The Department of Safety put it out there. Why? I don’t have the inside track so let’s consider the reasons.
So here we are, less than a month away from the FirstNet RFP and look what New Hampshire’s Dept of Safety does, they have to upstage FirstNet by issuing their own RFP, how cool is that? By the way, if you need another FirstNet history lesson go ahead and jump to page 8 of the RFP, it’s all there, again. Let’s go to page 17 where New Hampshire outlines the scope for the FirstNet deployment. It looks like they used the FirstNet RFP as a model and shortened it to 56 pages so that they get an idea of who would partner with them.
First off, if you have to work on these RFPs, it is a nightmare! In this case, it seems obvious they are looking for a partner and pricing. It doesn’t look like the partner will be an integrator, my interpretation. We have to prepare for the big one in a month and now it appears that New Hampshire is covering its bases. They probably want to see who will bite, before the big FirstNet RFP, so they understand the risks of opting out and the pricing. Will they Opt Out? Probably not but now they have done their due diligence.
It seems that they are looking for someone who can design and create a system for their state or a carrier with a system already in place. It seems they want to compare pricing with this versus FirstNet. I think that it’s great they’re looking into it, but seriously, how many people will have the time to look at this? The FirstNet RFP will be released in about 3 weeks and right before a huge holiday season. I know that we are all eager for work but this should really be handled along with the existing FirstNet RFP. It will be hard to stay motivated on this knowing that they are using it to compare.
So what can you do? Wait for the large system integrators to respond or see if a carrier picks it up and then see if you can tag along as a smaller vendor. See if they will pick you up as a partner.
Remember that this may or may not be used, so for the smaller integrators to spend time on this may be a drain on your resources. It looks like they are going to use it to compare the option of opting in or opting out. If you are the one responding then you know how long it will take to formulate a respectable response. Hopefully you can do this with the real FirstNet RFP in a few weeks. Maybe do them altogether as one. Can it be done? Will the teams be able to work together? Only you know what your teams can and will do. I know some company’s setup firewalls between teams so they can’t necessarily share resources.
So it looks like they are going to use this for a comparison to FirstNet just in case they want to opt out. It looks as though they hope to see who the partners would be. It looks as though they think that this can be done with the FirstNet RFP, if I am reading this right.
I hope that helps, just a quick update on FirstNet.
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