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REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL
Enterprise Asset Track and Trace System (eATTS)
RFP- J0802-EATTS-2015
The due date for submitting bids for the Enterprise Asset Track and Trace System (eATTS) - RFPJ0802-EATTS-2015 has been extended from the original date of March 17, 2015 to April 6, 2015
4:00 PM local time. Accordingly, the Deadline for Questions/Inquiry Submission has been
extended from March 9, 2015 to April 2, 2015.
Bidders are required to provide the information below in the following manner:
 Complete list of goods and services with price and included in the cost proposal.
 Complete list of goods and services without price and included in the technical proposal.
Furthermore, this is to remind all potential bidders that soft copy of the technical and financial
proposals is mandatory. This can either be emailed and/or submitted on a CD.
Response to Clarification Questions
Question #1
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Question #2
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Question #3
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Question #4
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Question #5
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Do we provide the hardware?
Bidders are expected to provide specifications and indicative budgets for all
required hardware and system software needed to implement the required
solution. Also see item IV on page 22 and item #7 on page 30 of the RFP for
information on the existing infrastructure and pricing template.
Could we use Oracle or SQL DB?
The current ECX environment uses Microsoft SQL Server as stated in item #7
on page 30 of the RFP. However, bidders are expected to specify the RDBMS
supported, the RDBMS recommended, and, preferably, technical and pricing
options for the top 3 RDBMS solutions in the market.
What kind of support and warranty expected?
As stated in the RFP, bidders are expected to provide options for 1 year and 3
year annual maintenance and support factoring in the Implementation and
Sustainment Technical Assistance to be availed locally.
How many users are expected to use the system?
The last paragraph on page 8 of the RFP, right before item #5 discussed the
number of users envisaged. The system is expected to be used by various
users operating the various modules of the system discussed in the RFP.
How many locations will this serve?
ECX continues to expand its operations. There will be about 2,500 processing
stations and primary markets (where commodities are processed and/or
aggregated) located throughout the country where the bar coded bag tags will
be attached after processing the commodities and loaded on to trucks to be
sent to ECX warehouses. Currently, there are 19 ECX Delivery Centers, within
which there are a total of 60 physical warehouse locations. In addition, there
are about 80 - 100 warehouses operated by buyers of commodities traded at
Question #6
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Question #7
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Question #8
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Question #9
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ECX warehouse where the commodities purchased will then be reprocessed
according to contract entered and re-bagged before export shipment. The
international buyers of these commodities could be anywhere in the world but
their primary interest is in accessing the system and getting a report detailing
the origins of the commodities shipped to them and related transactional
traceability information.
How is the telecom infrastructure in Ethiopia?
The telecom infrastructure is evolving and expanding. The connectivity within
the capital city is good and there exists 3G network with 4G on the way – this
is in addition to wired broadband access available throughout the country.
Outside of the capital city, there is fairly stable PSTN and 2G network but, in
some areas especially in the rural parts of the country, it is unreliable and
experiences some outages. Therefore, the solution proposed needs to factor
in this reality and be able to work in an offline mode for scanning of bar code
tags for eventual upload via a cradle or existence of a Wi-Fi or mobile network
at a nearby delivery center or centrally networked workstation. The
underlying system and connectivity to the ECX delivery centers can be
assumed to exist as is the case for connectivity from the buyers’ warehouse to
the proposed centralized and hosted system. See the RFP for further details.
Please provide clarification of the deliverable listed as “Customization
Requirements Traceability Matrix”.
It is expected that the proposed product will need to be customized to meet all
the stated requirements in the RFP. In order to manage scope and
expectations, the bidder will be expected to submit, as part of the project
deliverable, Customization Requirements Traceability Matrix specifying the
customizations to be done on the proposed product.
The RFP estimates the scale of the project at 5 million 60kg bags, elsewhere
estimating 300,000 tons. Could you please confirm that these figures refer
to parchment coffee traded through the ECX? (not to green coffee exported)
The estimated 5 million bags are system wide projections including other
commodities than just coffee. While there is no mention of 300,000 tons in
the RFP, the 200,000 tons of coffee mentioned in the RFP is referring to the
projected coffee export for calendar year 2014/15.
Please clarify the technical information to Interface with ECX system.
It is stated in the RFP that there is an existing warehouse receipting and
inventory management system managed by ECX. As such, there will be
information that eATTS will need from ECX or send to ECX. This is to avoid
duplicate entry of data and enable both systems to operate as efficiently as
possible.
For instance, the Goods Received Note (GRN) or Electronic Warehouse Receipt
Number is generated by ECX. On the other hand, eATTS tracks and traces
every bag but there will need to be a link between the bags being tracked by
eATTS and the corresponding GRN numbers created and maintained by ECX.
Therefore, a standard interfacing protocol will need to be mutually agreed and
Question #10
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Question #11
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Question #12
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Question #13
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Question #14
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Question #15
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Question #16
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implemented to have both systems operate and leverage each other
information in an integrated fashion. ECX already has experience in building
and implementing similar interfaces.
Regarding SMS system, please clarify if there is SMSC to interface with or
should we propose SIM bank to send SMS from?
ECX currently hosts and offers its own SMS-based service to disseminate
market information either on pull or push bases. This service can be leveraged
by eATTS. Bidders are of course encouraged to propose and suggest their own
solution offering, if deemed necessary.
Any requirements to track trucks GPS in the future?
The scope of this RFP does not include this requirement. However, the
evaluation of each offer does consider the scalability, extensibility, and
additional future feature and functions of the proposed solution.
Are existing HW IBM Blade Center H and HX5 able to support eATTS capacity
requirements?
The response to this question is dependent on the bidder’s solution, not on
ECX. As such, the RFP clearly requires each bidder to propose the required
hardware, system software, and RDBMS with indicative pricing, precisely so
that ECX can determine whether or not its existing assets can host the
proposed solution and if not, to understand the investment requirements.
Do you have database license to support the new eATTS?
See response to Question #12 above.
To trace and track uniquely for each bag, please clarify if you are interested in
RF ID solution.
The decision to consider bar code tags is based on weighing the likely higher
investment and sustainment costs associated with RFID based solution.
However, the proposed solution needs be capable of allowing a migration from
bar code tag to RFID tag in the future.
Bidders may propose RFID based solution as an alternate option for
consideration.
Do you have any preference solution for eATTS while network is down?
It is expected that the scanning of bar code tags should be designed to operate
with or without connectivity to the central system assuming the scanned data
can then be transferred/synchronized when connection is up. Bidders are
expected to propose their practical and cost effective solution for such and
other scenarios.
Do you want separate tag to be in each bag for every transfer or you are
looking for a single tag with history by removing all the previous tags.
History must be maintained in order to ultimately produce a report describing
the composition of the coffee origins making up the consignment being
shipped to the international buyer as per prearranged contract.
As stated in the RFP, the same bar code tag is expected to remain with the bag
while the bag is in ECX possession and on arrival at the Exporters/Buyer
warehouse and during processing. After processing and re-bagging for
shipment to the international buyer, a separate bar code tag will need to be
attached as discussed in the RFP. However, it is important to note that this
new bar code tag will need to maintain the history of origins of the various
bags (now mixed/combined in each bag after processing) collectively being
processed to fulfill a specific contract/coffee blend/type.
Correction
The sentence below in the first paragraph on page 3, section II is removed from the RFP.
Four of the main roasters who buy approximately 25 - 30% of Ethiopian export grade coffee report
that they have reduced the amount of Ethiopian coffee they buy in recent years because it no
longer meets their requirements.