Text Box: Page 7 ò Return to Page 1 Text Box: STC LINES—April 2005 Text Box: Text Box: effect of each of the three complex components of charges (equipment, implementation and lifecycle maintenance) on the total cost of ownership, especially with respect to how customers’ views of their “total” costs can change when considering all three of these charges versus just one or two. A tight set of SLA metrics were included to help differentiate the RFP responses with respect to warranty and extended maintenance terms for various response time categories and trouble analysis and repair processes. The bid specification excluded LAN/WAN infrastructure, as well as network cabling and wiring. The study’s findings consist primarily of a detailed comparison and analysis of the vendor responses to the RFP, with particular attention on the hazards of attempting to draw bottom-line conclusions about the superiority of any one response. Bid Specifications Table 2 summarizes the specified system in terms of product and functional requirements. Implementation Elements The RFP required all respondents to bid an IP Readiness Assessment for the entire network, as well as provide per-site pricing for configuring the system, installing the system, training administrators and end users, and managing the project. The objective here was to ensure that comparable responses would be received for what many bids designate only as “Installation.” Who Responded Avaya, and NEC Unified Solutions responded at the corporate level with bids for their own products. NextiraOne and Shared Technologies responded with bids for Nortel Text Box: New Dimensions in TCO, Part One

Table 2:  Functional Requirements                Courtesy of InfoTech

 

line price quotes can be misleading, given the wide range of charges in each of the three cost categories. Figure 1 displays the charges from each of the five full responders, by category.

Note that among the five full respondents, the range in product system charges was 119%, the range in implementation

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solutions, and Norstan bid a Cisco solution. Siemens responded with a partial bid.

       The study acknowledged these six respondents for the considerable time and dedication invested by their representatives in detailing their responses to the RFP requirements.

Some Conclusions

       The relative closeness of the aggregated bids in terms of bottom-

Figure 1: TCO Charges, By Respondent & Category Courtesy InfoTech

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note:  Shared Technologies bid a Nortel MCS 5100 system to meet the conferencing requirements. This provided much more functionality than was required. Had Shared Technologies used Meridian ICB (Integrated Conference Bridge) cards, their total bid would have been much more in line with the others.