OCRE – IaaS+ Cloud Framework

Procurement 2020

OPEN PROCEDURE
Volume 0: Information for Bidders

Dissemination GÉANT Public

Level:
Owner GÉANT Procurement
Version 1.0 - March 10 2020
Reference: OCRE – IaaS+ Cloud 2020

© GÉANT Vereniging, 2020

Contents

Definitions 4

Introduction 6
About GÉANT 6
About the OCRE project 6
Objective of this Procurement 6
Portfolio of Services, Framework Agreements and Contracting 8

Procurement Process 8
Overview 8

Guidance Notes for Bidders 10

Structure of Tender Document 10
Communications 10
Clarification Questions 10

General Rules and Conditions 10

Surveys, Inspections and Investigations 11
Bidding Costs 11
Confidentiality 11
Accuracy of the Information and liability of GÉANT and their advisers 12
Copyright 12
GÉANT right to reject the Service 12
Amendments to the Documents 12
Subcontractors 12
Validity of Offers 13

Annex A Participating entities 14

Annex B Annex B - Consumption 15

GEANT 2016 IaaS tender consumption 16
OCRE tender volume commitments 16
NREN commitments 16
OCRE adoption fund 16
OCRE Contract value 17
Specific Country Considerations 17
The Netherlands 17
B.4.1.1 Introduction 17
B.4.1.2 Role of SURF in the OCRE tender and the agreements resulting from this tender
18
B.4.1.3 Current IaaS and PaaS uptake in the Netherlands 18
B.4.1.4 60 million euro Buyer Group commitment 18
 B.4.1.5 Professional Services 19
B.4.1.6 Exclusion 19

Table of Tables

Table 2.1: Procurement Plan 9

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Definitions
TERM DEFENITION
“2016 Regulations” Dutch Public Procurement Act (Aanbestedingswet 2012, revised 1 July 2016)
Bidder / Bidders An Economic Operator (including consortia or joint venture arrangements) who submits
a Tender to this Call for Competition.
“Call for Competition” this document and any subsequent clarifications.
“Commencement Date” means the date of signing of the Framework Agreement.
“Customer(s)” NRENs and their connected Institutions, individual research institutes and other entities
as set out in the OJEU Notice and Annex A in Volume 0 of the Call for Competition.
“Economic Operator” means any natural or legal person or public entity or group of such persons and/or
entities, including any temporary association of undertakings, which offers the supply of
IaaS on the market.
“eduGAIN” eduGAIN is an Identity Federation service developed within the GEANT Project and
providing Single Sign-on capability enabling authentication (e.g. to verify Education or
student status) and easy access to services such as those addressed by the current Call
for Competition. eduGAIN interconnects member institutions and their end users to a
large number of service providers and also other identity federations around the world,
simplifying access to content, services and resources for the global research and
education community. eduGAIN enables the trustworthy exchange of information
related to identity, authentication and authorization (AAI) by coordinating elements of
the federations’ technical infrastructure and providing a policy framework that controls
this information exchange. eduGAIN has been widely adopted by NRENs and their client
institutions and has become an effective gateway to a large number of services.
http://services.geant.net/edugain/Pages/Home.aspx
“Framework Agreement” A Framework Agreement is an 'umbrella agreement' that sets out the terms
(particularly relating to price, quality and quantity) under which individual contracts
(call-offs) can be made throughout the period of the agreement.
“GEANT Cloud Team” The GEANT Cloud Team is made up of NREN members across many European countries
to collaborate on cloud service delivery and adoption.
“GEANT Network” GÉANT interconnects Europe's national research and education networking (NREN)
organisations with a high bandwidth, high speed and highly resilient pan-European
backbone – connecting Europe's researchers, academics and students to each other, and
linking them to over half the countries in the world. For further info see:
https://www.geant.org/Networks/Pan-European_network/Pages/Home.aspx
“IaaS+” See paragraph 1.3 and ‘Solution’

“Institutions” organisations connected to NRENs, individual research institutes and other entities as
set out in the OJEU Notice and Annex A in Volume 0 of the Call for Competition
“IP” Intellectual property
“NREN” A National Research and Education Network (NREN) is a specialised internet service
provider dedicated to supporting the needs of the research and education communities
within a country. The Research and Education community within each country relies on
its NREN, amongst others, to advise and guide in adopting IT and to provide the right
solutions
The NREN provides national connectivity to the Research and Education community in a
country and the European NRENs are connected to GEANT.
Offer An offer submitted by a Bidder to this Tender.

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 “OIP” Original Infrastructure Provider. The entity that owns and operates the infrastructure
solution (platform) offered. Bids may either be direct from an OIP or an authorised
reseller of an OIP
“OJEU Notice” the notice published in the Official Journal of the European Union in relation to this
procurement.
Platform or Solution See #10 In paragraph 1.3

“Point of Presence” or “PoP” a building which houses terminal equipment to which the Service Items are connected.

“Portal” means the GEANT eProcurement Portal available via www.supply2.geant.org

“Procurement Team” means a cross-departmental team from GÉANT and NRENs established for this
procurement.
“Referrer” Where the NREN acts as intermediary by making the Framework Agreements available
in its respective country and facilitating connected institutions in purchasing from
Suppliers. (Direct delivery model).
“Underwriter” expanding on the referrer role, the NREN is responsible for more activities and also
involved in the contracting and billing of (some of) its Institutions’ service orders. The
Supplier interfaces primarily with the NREN and the NREN may provide additional value-
added services to the end-user institution and represents the aggregated volume, often
buying upfront and invoice the individual institutions.
GEANT may also act as an Underwriter and provide contracting and billing in cases where
an NREN asks GEANT to fulfil this role.
“Research institutes” are organisations which undertake creative and systematic work in order to increase the
stock of knowledge – including knowledge of humankind, culture and society – and to
devise new applications of available knowledge.
“Service Item” an identifiable component of the Service specified in Volume 2 of this Call for
Competition.
“Services” the solution provided by the Supplier as a set of Service Items as specified in Volume 2
of this Call for Competition.
“Solution” the proposed or selected IaaS+ solution to meet the requirements defined in the tender
documentation. See the definition of Solution in section 1.3. The Solution is provided by
an OIP.
“Supplier” A Bidder who is awarded a Framework Agreement.
“Tender” The bid(s) prepared and submitted by each Bidder in response to the Call for
Competition.

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 Introduction

About GÉANT
1. The GÉANT Association (GÉANT) has more than 20 years supporting Research and Education Networks and Services being
formed on 7 October 2014 when DANTE and TERENA joined forces. The GÉANT Association has offices in Amsterdam (formerly
TERENA) and Cambridge (formerly DANTE/GÉANT Ltd).

2. GÉANT is a not-for-profit organisation, wholly owned by the GÉANT Association BV. The GÉANT Association BV is owned by
its core membership of 39 European National Research and Education Network (NREN) organisations and NORDUnet, which
participates on behalf of five Nordic NRENs.

3. GÉANT plans, builds and operates advanced networks for research and education, including the pan-European network
known as GÉANT.

4. GÉANT executes this tender procedure on behalf of its members and may also act as a purchasing body on behalf of those
members.

6. The GÉANT organisation is registered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands (GÉANT Vereniging (Association) is registered with
the Chamber of Commerce in Amsterdam with registration number 40535155 and operates in the UK as a branch of GÉANT
Vereniging. Registered office: Hoekenrode 3, 1102BR Amsterdam, The Netherlands. UK branch address: City House, 126-130
Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 1PQ, UK)

About the OCRE project

5. European Research and Education institutes are eager to use and benefit from cloud services. However, the cloud brings a
paradigm shift in distribution and usage models. This requires a new approach to connect the supply and demand sides and
establish the right conditions of use. This tender is the effort of the OCRE project (Open Clouds for Research Environments),
representing a consortium of partners which includes Trust-IT; the RHEA Group; and GEANT (on behalf of the European
Research and Education Networks (NRENs). It aims to contribute to establishing a service delivery chain, to enable Research
and Education institutes in Europe to adopt and use IaaS cloud solutions, in an easy, safe, predictable and controlled manner.

6. In the consortium, the European NRENs and broader research community collaborate on cloud delivery and adoption, share
expertise and resources, align roadmaps and jointly engage the market. Through this collective tender, the OCRE project wants
to put in place agreements with Suppliers of Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS+) solutions and connect these to the Research
and Education IT ecosystem. GEANT, all NRENs (and their institutions) and other European research institutes that are part of
this tender, will be entitled to use its outcomes without any additional procurement being required

7. The OCRE Project has an objective to leverage network connectivity, identity management and other established services
to help accelerate the adoption of cloud services and remove barriers for the European research and education community,
hereafter referred to as the Customers.

8. This OCRE IaaS+ Cloud tender is the first in a number of tenders that will be executed in support of the broader OCRE project.
It is planned that this will be followed by a tender supporting the research community focused on the Earth Observation
Services. Potentially there will be further tenders under the OCRE project, subject to demand.

Objective of this Procurement

9. The purpose of the procurement initiative is to bridge the demand and supply sides for IaaS+ and related services. It is being
conducted as an Open Procedure in accordance with the Dutch Public Procurement Act (Aanbestedingswet 2012, revised 1
July 2016)

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 • Establish a framework and make it easy for Customers to consume IaaS+ solutions in a manner compliant with
European procurement legislation and with the right conditions of use. By aggregating demand across the
Customers and negotiating integrated brokerage and service delivery, the Customers will be able to get the best
possible value from cloud services.

• Provide a direct route for Economic Operators to more easily and efficiently reach and deliver their IaaS solutions to
customers.

10. An ‘IaaS(+) solution’ or Solution is in this Tender defined as follows (:

An ‘IaaS(+) solution’ or Solution provides an on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data
storage and computing power without direct active management by the user.

This IaaS(+) solution or Solution consists of:

- IaaS Infrastructure as a Service
where the consumer is able to deploy and run arbitrary software, which can include operating systems
and applications. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure but
has control over operating systems, storage, and deployed applications; and possibly limited control
of select networking components (e.g., host firewalls)

Note: This definition of compute may include server and serverless computing for example virtual
machines, FGPA’s, etc.

This IaaS(+) solution or Solution may (optionally) also offer:

- PaaS (Platform as a Service)
The capability provided to the consumer is to deploy onto the cloud infrastructure consumer-created
or acquired applications created using programming languages, libraries, services, and tools
supported by the provider. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud
infrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, or storage, but has control over the
deployed applications and possibly configuration settings for the application-hosting environment.

- SaaS (Software as a Service)

Complementary Software services utilising Bidders Public IaaS / PaaS resources These
complementary software service offerings must utilize (or be based on or directly related to) the
Bidders Public IaaS resources (CPU, memory, storage, networking).
Managed services or license based (e.g. VMs with applications pre-installed from a vendor's cloud
"marketplace") services and general PaaS and SaaS services available in the marketplace and
running in customer tenancies, may be included but these must be a direct consequence of the
usage of IaaS services.

The definitions used for IaaS and PaaS are taken from the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (www.nist.gov)
The word Platform is in the tender documents also used for This IaaS(+) solution or Solution. So when in the tender documents
Platform is used it should be read as This IaaS(+) solution or Solution.

11. The Tender aims to ensure that:

• Suppliers offer an IaaS+ feature set which matches the Customers’ needs

• Customers get access to a broad range of services fitting their needs from multiple Suppliers

• Data is handled safely and Suppliers meet European and National regulations

• The Customers can aggregate demand and costs are affordable and predictable

• Services can be acquired and used through the Customers’ purchasing and management structures (such as
accepting Purchase Orders and post billing)

• Services are connected to and compatible with the Customer’s network and Identity Management capabilities.

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12. Although it is the objective of GÉANT and all parties mentioned in the OJEU Notice and Annex Ain Volume 0 of the Call for
Competition to promote and utilize the Framework Agreements as much as possible, no guarantee however can be given that
all institutes (universities, schools, etc.) will actually use the Call off Agreements under the Framework Agreements.
Contracting authorities are not obliged pursuant to this Directive to procure works, supplies or services that are covered by a
framework agreement, under that framework agreement

13. Institution who have chosen to make use of the OCRE Framework Agreements are expected to continue using the OCRE
Framework Agreements for future IaaS+ services during the lifespan unless suppliers fail to deliver according to the KPI’s
agreed upon in the Call-Off agreement.

14. As Cloud consumption in the Research and Education community varies heavily per country it is impossible to provide a
reliable spend estimate under the framework contract for the next 4 years. In 2019 the aggregated consumption under the
2016 Cloud framework was € 15 million. This consumption between 2020 and 2024 is expected to grow substantially, see
Annex B for more details.

15. External factors, such as (but not limited to): local procurement rules and regulations; existing technical infrastructure,
other Framework Agreements with overlapping scope and better commercial offers from external parties may cause services
scoped in this Tender to be procured elsewhere. Neither GÉANT nor the parties mentioned in Annex A can be held responsible
when an Institute decides to procure the scoped services elsewhere.

Portfolio of Services, Framework Agreements and Contracting

16. It is the intention that the conclusion of this procurement process will result in a number of Framework Agreements for
IaaS+ solutions awarded to Bidders who pass the Call for Competition evaluation, resulting in a portfolio of services for the
Customers to consume. The Frameworks will provide standardised contract terms for use by the research and education
community. This will remove, or will at least significantly reduce, the local overhead for technical, commercial or legal activities
typically required when engaging new Suppliers. As a result, this procurement will significantly reduce the barriers for the
Customers to consume IaaS+ solutions.

17. Framework Agreements are awarded to Bidders (who are selected in accordance with the mechanisms described within
this Call for Competition) for up to four years from the signing of the contract.

18. It is expected that the Framework agreements will be signed and become operational in Q3 2020. The Framework
agreements will have a contract term of 48 months and will therefore be valid until Q3 2024.

19. The term of each Call-Off Contract shall be as agreed between the parties to the Call-Off Contract but shall not in any event
exceed four (4) years.

20. The OCRE project team will communicate the portfolio of services resulting from the procurement initiative to the
Customers via various channels (including the NRENs and known Research collaborations) and will work with Bidders who
secure a Framework Agreement on an ongoing basis to facilitate service adoption

21. Customers as described in Annex A will be able to establish a contract with Suppliers directly (either through a subsequent
competition or direct call-off order), by placing a call-off contract/order during the operational life of the Framework
Agreement and under the terms of the Framework Agreement.

Procurement Process

Overview
22. GÉANT is using the Open Procedure under the Dutch Public Procurement Act (Aanbestedingswet 2012, revised 1 July 2016).

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23. Bidders are deemed to understand the processes that GÉANT is following under those Regulations and all applicable
European Legislation and case law.

24. Bidders participate in the process and submit detailed Offers in the knowledge, and on the understanding and acceptance
that these directives and rules apply to the end-to-end procurement process and agree that these directives and rules apply
unequivocally and that they will demonstrate adherence to them.

25. By participating in this Procurement Bidders are deemed to understand and comply with the procedures and conditions
set out within this Volume 0, and as clarified in the other Volumes of the Tender Documents, as amended.

26. By participating in this Procurement Bidders agree to refrain from legal procedures questioning any legality of this tender,
the Framework Agreements and or the Call of Agreements after the standstill period.

27. GÉANT acknowledges that the Corona pandemic may affect Bidders’ abilities to respond to this tender. GÉANT tries to
mitigate this by allowing Bidders significantly more time to respond to this tender as the legal minimum term. Bidders are
explicitly invited to use the Clarification Question process as described in section 3.3 to seek further extension if their ability
to respond is hampered by resource challenges related to the Corona pandemic

28. GÉANT reserve the right to withdraw from this procurement process at any time up to signature of a Framework
Agreement and to disqualify late bids.

29. Table 2.1 below, Procurement Plan, provides an overview of the dates in this Open Procedure procurement process.

30. GÉANT reserve the right to change these dates as necessary, although they will seek to minimise any changes.

Tender actions Days Start Finish

Publish OJEU notice & ITT (Open Procedure) incl.

0 10 April2020
contract terms

Webinair 27 April– 13:00 CET

Period that questions can be send in 40 10 April 2020 20 May 2020

GÉANT will answers questions continuously. Final

22 May 2020
notice released

Bidder response time 53 10 April 2020 2 June 2020 – 12:00 CET

Deadline for sending in Offers 2 June 2020 – 12:00 CET

Evaluate submitted Offers* 2 June 2020 Mid-September 2020

Intent to Award Contract(s) sent out & Debrief

End June 2020 End October 2020
failed bidders via correspondence

Contract production and finalization July 2020 November 2020

Start Date Framework Agreements July / August 2020 31 December 2020

Table 2.1: Tender timeline
*Bids will be assessed and evaluated per waives of Lots. The first Lots will be evaluated in June, evaluation of all Lots
is expected to last until mid-September 2020. As soon as a Lot is evaluated Bidders will be informed of the outcome.
All dates in the table after June 2 are therefore mentioned a guidance only. Exact dates per Lot will be communicated
during the course of the evaluation process.

On Monday the 27th of April a webinar is hosted, available for all potentials Bidders. Next to a short overview and
explanation of the objectives of this tender and the procurement procedure In this webinar background is given on GÉANT,
the NREN’s and the community they serve. To attend the webinar registration needs to be done via
https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN__VX35MsESN2601jl_7JxhA

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 Guidance Notes for Bidders

Structure of Tender Document

31. All documents related to this procedure are available to download via the eProcurement Portal at
https://supply2.geant.org

32. This document “Information for Bidders” is Volume 0 of a set of 4 (0 to 3) comprising the Tender Document relating to
Stage 1 of this 2-stage Open Procedure, and which includes the following volumes:

33. Volume 0: this volume, contains an overview of GÉANT, the NREN’s, the Institutions, and the procurement process,
guidance notes for Bidders and general conditions.

34. Volume 1: is the “Guidance document to ESPD form” The actual ESPD form in only available in the Negometrix
eProcurement portal.

35. Volume 2: is the “Invitation to Tender (ITT)”, which sets out the qualitative technical, operational and commercial
requirements.

36. Volume 3: is the “Framework Agreement” and the “Call-Off Agreement”, which contains the Terms and Conditions of
Contract which will be used for contracting with the Supplier/s, subject to agreeing final terms and warranties.

Communications
37. All communications between GÉANT and the Bidders shall take place via the eSourcing Portal. This is to provide a complete
audit trail of communications, fair play, and consistency for all, and to ensure certainty in document exchange.

Clarification Questions
38. Bidders may submit Clarification Questions at any time between receiving the ITT and the deadline to submit them to
GÉANT.

39. For audit purposes and to ensure fair play, all clarification questions must only be sent through the eProcurement portal.

40. All clarification questions and responses will be shared with all Bidders by default, subject to Confidentiality conditions as
set out in section 4.3.

41. If a Bidder does not wish to share their question due to commercial sensitivity, they should advise GÉANT at the time the
question is submitted along with the reason for this. If this justification is expressly accepted by GÉANT, a response will be
given in confidence to the Bidder raising the clarification. If not accepted, the Bidder will be given the opportunity to withdraw
the question and/or ask for it not be published or accept that it will be published and shared with all other Bidders.

General Rules and Conditions

42. In addition to what is specified in the Customers as described in Annex A will be able to establish a contract with Suppliers
directly (either through a subsequent competition or direct call-off order), by placing a call-off contract/order during the
operational life of the Framework Agreement and under the terms of the Framework Agreement.

43. Procurement Process and Guidance Notes for herein, and the conditions set out in the other volumes of the Tender
Document, the following general rules and conditions shall apply to all stages of this procurement.

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 Surveys, Inspections and Investigations
44. GÉANT reserve the right to conduct reference site visits or to make contact with Bidders’ points of contact at any time
during this procurement process.

45. Bidders will only carry out surveys, inspections and investigations at their own cost and only following express permission
from GÉANT.

Bidding Costs
46. Each Bidder shall bear their own costs of bidding. GÉANT reserve their position as to whether or not to enter into
contractual arrangements and participation in the procurement is entirely at the Bidder’s risk. GÉANT shall bear no liability
whatsoever for the outcome of the procurement and shall not be liable for supplier costs, direct or indirect, relating to the
preparation of detailed Services or Solutions, fine-tuning, or any loss of profit or other economic loss whatsoever incurred by
Suppliers or Bidders as a result of this Open procedure process (whether or not an agreement is concluded with the Bidder in
question, another Bidder or not at all).

47. Any expenditure, costs, liability, work or effort undertaken or incurred by the Bidders in proceeding with and/or
participating in this procurement ("Bidder Costs, direct or indirect") is a matter solely for the commercial judgement of Bidder.
GÉANT will not be liable to reimburse or compensate the Bidders in respect of any of the Bidder Costs, whether direct or
indirect. Bidders participate in this process and submit detailed Services or Solutions in the knowledge and understanding that
this is the case.

Confidentiality
48. The information in this Tender Document is being made available by GÉANT on condition that:
• Bidders shall at all times treat the Information as confidential
• Bidders shall not (or allow anyone else to) disclose, copy, reproduce, distribute or pass on the Information to any
other person at any time or allow any of these things to happen
• Bidders shall not use the Information for any purpose other than for the purpose of proposing (or deciding whether
to propose) Services or Solutions.

49. Bidders shall not contact nor make any statement or pass comment to the media in relation to the procurement or this
Tender Document set without the express approval of GÉANT in writing. Bidders shall not undertake (or permit) at any time,
whether at this stage or after any contract award, any publicity activity with any section of the media other than with the prior
written agreement of GÉANT. Such agreement shall extend to the content of any publicity. In this paragraph the word ‘media’
includes, without limitation, radio, television, other broadcast media, newspapers or other print media, trade and specialist
press, the Internet and e-mail accessible by the public at large and the representatives of such media

50. Bidders may only disclose, distribute or pass Information to another person (including but not limited to, for example, legal
advisers, the Bidders insurers, etc.) if either:
• this is done for the sole purpose of enabling Services or Solutions to be drawn up; and
• the person receiving the Information undertakes in writing to keep the Information confidential on the same terms
as set out in this section 4.3; or
• the Bidder obtains the prior written consent of GÉANT in relation to such disclosure, distribution or passing of
Information.

51. GÉANT may disclose detailed information relating to Services or Solutions to its or any of the NRENs’ directors, officers,
employees, agents, auditors or advisers. GÉANT also reserves the right to disseminate information that is materially relevant
to the Contract to all Bidders, even if the information has only been requested by one Bidder, subject to the duty to protect
any Bidders commercial confidence in its Services or Solutions. GÉANT will act reasonably as regards the protection of
commercially sensitive information relating to the Bidder in the light of the latest published guidance in this area.

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 Accuracy of the Information and liability of GÉANT and their advisers
52. This Tender Document has been prepared by GÉANT in good faith but does not purport to be comprehensive or to have
been independently verified. Bidders should not rely on the Information and should carry out their own due diligence checks
and verify the accuracy of the Information. Nothing in this Tender Document is or shall be a promise or representation as to
the future.

53. Bidders considering entering into a contractual relationship with GÉANT should carry out their own due diligence, make
their own enquiries and investigations (and shall be deemed to have done so). The subject matter of this Tender Document
shall only have contractual effect when it is contained in the express terms of an executed Framework Agreement.

54. Neither GÉANT nor its members, directors, officers, employees, agents, auditors or advisers make any representation or
warranty as to, or accept any liability or responsibility in relation to, the adequacy, accuracy, reasonableness or completeness
of the Information or any part of it (including but not limited to loss or damage arising as a result of reliance by the Bidder on
any of the Information contained in this Tender Document).

55. GÉANT makes no representations or warranties regarding the Bidders financial status or stability, technical competence
or ability in any way to carry out the Project.

Copyright
56. The copyright in the documents comprising this Tender Document is vested in GÉANT and may not be reproduced, copied
or stored in any medium without the prior written consent of GÉANT. This Tender Document, and any document issued as
supplemental to it, are and shall remain the property of GÉANT and must be returned upon demand.

GÉANT right to reject the Service

57. The issue of this Tender Document in no way commits GÉANT to award any Framework Agreement pursuant to this
procurement process and GÉANT shall be able at its sole discretion to withdraw from the procurement with any Bidder, or all
Bidders, at any time and at no cost, either direct or indirect, for GÉANT.

58. GÉANT may (but shall not be obliged), at its discretion but always acting proportionately and in accordance with Public
Procurement Rules, deselect a Bidder or a Service or Solution, if (without limitation):
• the price is unaffordable
• the Service places excessive risk on GÉANT
• the Bid scores below the satisfactory minimum threshold in any area (as described further in the evaluation criteria)
and/or
• the Service or Solution is incomplete, misleading or inaccurate.

Amendments to the Documents

59. GÉANT reserves the right to issue amendments or modifications to the Tender Documents. These will be issued to all
Bidders simultaneously and Services or Solutions will be assumed to take account of any such modifications and amendments.

Subcontractors
60. Where a Bidder intends to use a subcontractor(s), it will be the responsibility of the Bidder to provide the subcontractor(s)
with all the necessary information (having regard to the provisions relating to confidentiality in this Tender Document) and to
provide GÉANT with all similar information about the Subcontractor(s) as requested by GÉANT of the Bidder. All information
about the subcontractor(s) should be submitted through the eProcurement portal by the same dates as per table 2.1 Tender
timeline.

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61. GÉANT recognises that arrangements in relation to subcontracting may be subject to future changes. However, Bidders
should be aware that where the nominated subcontractors play a significant role, any changes to the subcontracting
arrangements may constitute a material change to their tender (including the ESPD form and ITT response) and may affect
their ability to continue in the procurement process. GÉANT should therefore be advised immediately if any such change
occurs.

Validity of Offers
62. All offers made in response to this procurement shall be available for acceptance until at least 6 months days after the
deadline for sending in offers. See table 2.1.

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Annex A Participating entities

In Annex A per Lot all entities are mentioned that are eligible to use the framework. Per Lot the named NREN is eligible to
procure against the frameworks together with all Institutes, Organisations and other entities that are listed by the NREN. In
some Lots additional organisations are mentioned that are not represented by the NREN but who still are eligible to procure
under the framework.

The GÉANT organisation is eligible to procure under each of the 40 Lots. To allow GÉANT to subsidise, sponsor or pay for
IaaS+ services on behalf of eligible Users of the framework agreements it must be able to procure services under all Lots.
This provision is derived from the rules and regulations in the Grant Agreement between the EC and GÉANT.

If GÉANT procures IaaS+ services for its own operations procurement will take place via Lot 27, the Netherlands.

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The above tables are also available as a sperate document on the eProcurement poral,

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Annex B Annex B - Consumption

GEANT 2016 IaaS tender consumption

The majority of the Framework Agreements resulting from the 2016 GEANT IaaS tender were signed in April 2017 after which
institutions were made aware of the opportunities. Consumption took off slowly but has been increasing continuously.
Currently, over 400 institutions make use of the 2016 GEANT IaaS tender. Annual consumption:

2017: 3 Mio Euro

2018: 7 Mio Euro
2019: 15 Mio Euro

OCRE tender volume commitments

NREN commitments

The individual NRENs within GEANT have each provided estimates of the consumption in their country through OCRE. This is
over the 4-year period of the Framework lifespan, excluding consumption through Call off Agreements running until after the
Framework agreements expires. Listed underneath are the conservative and realistic consumption estimates of the most
prominent countries

The individual NRENs within GEANT have each provided estimates of the consumption in their country through OCRE. This is
over the 4-year period of the Framework lifespan, excluding consumption through Call off Agreements running until after the
Framework agreements expires. Listed underneath are the conservative and realistic consumption estimates of the most
prominent countries

OCRE adoption fund

Once he OCRE IaaS+ framework agreements are in place, the OCRE project will stimulate adoption of Cloud services covered
in this Tender during 2020 and 2021. The amount available for adoption funding is €4.2 million

Eligible users of IaaS+ frameworks can apply for OCRE adoption funding. An awarding process is in place to allocated funds to
Users if demand for adoption funding is greater than funds available.

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The adoption funds are made available to the OCRE project by the European Commission under grant number 824079

OCRE Contract value

The following aspects have to be taken into account when estimating the contract value:

1. The IaaS+ consumption in Research and Education is lagging to that in e.g. commercial organisation

2. Many NRENs have a limited understanding of IaaS+ demand developments among their connected institutions over
the lifespan of the OCRE frameworks

3. One of the main objectives of the OCRE project is to create and further stimulate demand for IaaS+ services in
Europe. For this specific objective the EC has made funds available that are to be distributed via the frameworks
following this tender. Because of the current absence of demand for IaaS+ services in many Lots of this tender it is
difficult to predict contract volumes over a period of 4 years, especially since the stimulation of demand in one of
the main drivers behind this tender procedure. At the time of publication it is not known in which countries the EC
adoption funds are to be spend.

4. NRENs do not have the mandate to make choices for their connected institutions but are the innovation hubs who
inform and support their institutes with their digital transformation

5. The slow starting but rapid increase in consumption resulting from 2016 GEANT IaaS tender

6. The large number of institutions named as contracting authorities who can make use of the OCRE tender.

Acknowledging all aspects above and understanding that demand for IaaS+ is likely to grow during the contract period,
the published contract value on TED at the time of publishing this Tender for each lot will be set higher as the NREN estimates.
This is a proportional mitigation avoiding situations where a sudden rapid increase in consumption in a country necessitates a
new procurement exercise which would complicate adoption among institutions using the tender outcomes and be an
extensive process for both suppliers and the pan-European procurement team, and would create out-of-sync Frameworks
making future new pan-European tender even more complicated.

Bidders need to take into account that the contract value per Lot can therefore be significantly higher or lower than indicated.
No rights can be derived from the estimated displayed value in these documents or the published values per Lot in the OJEU
notice.

Specific Country Considerations

The Netherlands

B.4.1.1 Introduction

SURF (https://www.surf.nl/en), the collaborative organisation for ICT in education and research in the Netherlands, is one of
the oldest and most innovative NRENs in Europe. It currently uses three operating companies to deliver its services, who will
merge into one organisation (SURF) in 2020.

- SURFnet operates SURFcumulus, a cloud delivery platform which uses cloud services from the GEANT 2016 IaaS
tender and is used by over 116 institutions.

- SURFsara supports researchers and research groups to use cloud services.

- SURFmarket purchases and distributes software, cloud services and content.

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Volume 0: Information for Bidders pg. 17
B.4.1.2 Role of SURF in the OCRE tender and the agreements resulting from this tender

In the OCRE tender, SURF will act as a Buyer Group and underwriter for all Suppliers selected in this tender, for all members
of the SURF cooperative association. As such, SURF will be the sole entity giving its members access to the cloud services
resulting from the OCRE tender, which will involve buying resources (credits) in bulk. Together with the suppliers selected in
the OCRE tender, SURF will put in place the processes (and the optimal mix of roles and responsibilities) to do so.

Specifically, for primary and secondary education SURF will involve existing partners to deliver the services to these
organisations. In addition, institutions who are customers of SURF (and meet the SURF E&R criteria), but who are not members
of the SURF cooperative association, will be served by SURF in a referrer role.

B.4.1.3 Current IaaS and PaaS uptake in the Netherlands

2016 2017 2018 2019

SURFcumulus education 1 Mio 2 Mio 5.4 Mio 9.7 Mio

SURFcumulus research - - 100 K 500 K

Primary and Secondary education 300 K 500 K 700 K 1 Mio

Total 1.3 Mio 2.5 Mio 6.2 Mio 11,2 Mio

The table above shows the uptake for public IaaS and PaaS services in the Netherlands through SURF (SURFcumulus) and
through their partners delivering to Primary and Secondary Education.

B.4.1.4 60 million euro Buyer Group commitment

Cloud services will play an increasing role in education and research. SURF will, through the combined efforts of the three
operating companies, continue to support this transformation. The success of the cloud efforts to date, shows that SURF is
able to identify the needs of institutions, form partnerships with suppliers without losing its independent role as trusted
advisor and establish substantial use of cloud services.

SURF values the cloud efforts of GÉANT and the OCRE project. For the OCRE tender, SURF commits to a total consumption
value of 60 million euro, over the initial OCRE Framework duration of 4 years, divided as follows:

- 50 million euro for education

- 10 million euro for research.

These are conservative numbers (they will likely be higher) and there are only three situations which can be identified for not
meeting this commitment:

1. One or more of the larger suppliers fail to qualify for a framework contract in the OCRE tender.

2. Submitted offers by suppliers in the OCRE tender do not meet requirements and / or do not contain conditions of
use that are sufficiently attractive, including pricing discounts; hence are not a valuable proposition.

3. Severe issues around data privacy and security: such as a ‘Snowden like revelation’ or rulings on e.g. Cloud Act, which
lead to shifts in legislation and / or sourcing policies and decisions in SURF and the Dutch education and research
organisations.

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Volume 0: Information for Bidders pg. 18
As part of this buyer group commitment, SURF hereby applies on behalf of its members and all other organisations
participating through SURF in the OCRE tender (which includes researchers as well as research groups / institutions), for the
adoption funds which are available through the OCRE project. SURF will use such funds to stimulate usage of cloud services in
the research community. Teams within SURFsara will assist researchers and research groups in further applications necessary
and in using allocated funds. Also, SURF will ensure that all processes are in place for continued (paid) usage once the adoption
funds run out. This brings a true co-funding approach.

B.4.1.5 Professional Services

Institutions often require support during their digital transformation. To make the skills and capacities which exists in the
market (often through partners of selected suppliers) available to institutions, SURF will publish a European Procurement
(solely for use in the Netherlands) for Professional Services in Q2 2020. Through the frameworks resulting from this
procurement, institutions will be supported on the creation of landing zones, migration projects and Managed Services

B.4.1.6 Exclusion

In 2018 SURF published a public tender on Microsoft services, which encompasses all Microsoft services except for Microsoft
Azure, for Dutch Education and Research institutions. SURF and its institutions will honour the contracts resulting from this
tender. Hence, no Microsoft services within scope of this SURFmarket Microsoft tender (which include Office 365 and
Dynamics 365) will be procured through the OCRE tender by SURF and its institutions

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