ESBD_File_305618_Addendum 3 - Q&A.pdf

ADDENDUM 3

RFP783-22013 Source-to-Pay E-Procurement System

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

THIS ADDENDUM 3 IS FOR THE QUESTIONS AND ANSWER POSTED TO THE ESBD ON

11/1/2022.

SIGNATURE DATE

Questions and Answers

1. Whether companies from Outside USA can apply for this? (like,from India or Canada)

ANSWER: Vendors must meet the standards of the Texas Risk and Authorization Management Program that addresses and mitigates risks in cloud computing. Also, Vendor must provide the Higher Education Community Vendor Assessment Tool kit.

2. Whether we need to come over there for meetings?

ANSWER: No, most meetings would be conducted virtually via MS Teams or Zoom.

3. Can we perform the tasks (related to RFP) outside USA? (like, from India or Canada) ANSWER: See Question 1

4. Can we submit the proposals via email?

ANSWER:

No. The materials submitted must be enclosed in a sealed envelope (box or container); the package must show clearly the submittal deadline, and the name and the return address of the Respondent must be clearly visible.

5. How long a period will member institutions have to elect to purchase the Source to Pay [S2P] solution?

ANSWER: The University System is seeking a master/enterprise contract catalog pricing for S2P solution to provide the option for each University at its sole discretion to license and utilize the S2P software modules. As stated in the RFP, the first modules to be implemented are the e-sourcing and e-procurement.

6. We cannot commit to a single price for an indefinite period – would you expect that any member institution might take over 12 months to make a purchase determination?

ANSWER: Yes, per response to question 5 as well as the RFP, a University may elect to not utilize any of the S2P modules.

7. How long do you expect offered pricing to be valid for?

ANSWER: We anticipate that the resulting contract would have a contract term of up to 5 years and the catalog pricing would reflect the pricing and any annual escalations over that term.

8. Will vendors have to individually negotiate Terms & Conditions of sale with each purchasing institution?

ANSWER: No, the UH System utilizes the same Terms and Conditions that would be in the master/enterprise contract. Negotiation of additional campus specific terms and conditions is not necessary.

9. Will there be certain universal T & C’s (All contracts net30, liability conditions, etc)?

ANSWER: Yes, see answer #8.

10. Will there be a single vendor award?

ANSWER: The UH System anticipates awarding a single vendor; yet, the RFP does allow the awarding to more than one vendor.

11. Should a member institution want an option/solution that is not the winner of this initial award, is that institution eligible to produce an independent solicitation for just that institution (while this award is concurrently active)?

ANSWER: No, the source selection committee includes representatives from all UH System Universities and a unified system solution is sought.

12. Who will ultimately own negotiation and purchase of licenses for those solutions that involve 3rd party vendor software (Peoplesoft/Workday/Salesforce/SAP/Oracle Financials)?

ANSWER: The University has license to PeopleSoft 9.2 , which is the financial system of record.

13. Will such license negotiations have to be replicated/redone for each institution electing to buy the S2P solution under this award?

ANSWER: No, the S2P solution must include integration for PeopleSoft 9.2, which will continue to be the finance system of record.

14. Should an institution wish to purchase the S2P solution (under this award), how long a lead-time is allowable before vendor must begin implementation?

ANSWER: This will be negotiable and would be determined during contract formation.

15. Can you estimate the number of possible users (Total & Concurrent) for the initial instance (DT, CL) of this award to assist in sizing/scaling potential solutions?

ANSWER:

Requisition Access as a requisition creator, requester, or approver

Business Unit User Count

00730 533

00759 123

00765 121

00783 7

00784 141

Grand Total 925

16. Can you estimate user population values for any of the other potential UH system institutional customers?

ANSWER: See answer 14.

17. IT Focused: Does UH currently use/prefer specific middleware for integration of its systems?

ANSWER: No

18. IT Focused: How are integrations typically handled, owned by your IT group, managed by third party, implementer owned?

ANSWER: Usually with a combination of the University’s IT Group and managed by vendor or third party.

19. IT Focused: Are there any other competing initiatives during the engagement we should know about? (Ex: ERP upgrades, addtl. new solution implementations, etc.)

ANSWER: The university recently upgraded to PeopleSoft 9.2. We implemented DocuSign in September 2022.

20. Implementation Focused - Per this Statement in the RFP:

“Please note that the UH System is comprised of UH Central Campus, UHCL, UHD, and UHV. All UH System Universities are separate entities that share a common PeopleSoft ERP system.

However, each University has its own unique policies and business procedures. Further, each University would elect which S2P modules would be purchased (if any) for each University” Does UHS plan to have a single instance/environment(A single instance of the software and supporting infrastructure serve a single customer?

ANSWER: Perhaps, but this is dependent on the best value solution selected and upon the needs of each university. A single instance may be possible over time; yet, may not be realistic at the project start due to the variability of business processes.

21. Implementation Focused: With single tenancy, each customer has their independent database and instance of the software) single instance for all 4 institutions?

ANSWER: Please see the answer to question 20.

22. Implementation Focused: Or a single instance for each separate institution (so 4 unique instances as defined above)?

ANSWER: Please see answer to question 20.

23. Implementation Focused: Or a single instance for a subset of institutions? i.e. UH Central and Victoria will share a tenant?

ANSWER: Please see answer to question 20.

24. Implementation Focused: Do you plan to centralize business processes across the institutions or keep working as they are today?

ANSWER: The project would begin with keeping the University’s operating as they are today;

however, the processes may evolve to become more standardized over time.

25. Implementation Focused: If the latter, will each institution work with chosen partner to create their own SOW(Statement of Work) for their implementation for the modules they choose?

ANSWER: A project plan would need to be developed to meet the needs of each campus.

26. Implementation Focused: Does each institution have their own chart of accounts within the common Peoplesoft system or do they utilize common chart accounts?

ANSWER: Common chart of accounts

27. Implementation Focused: How will you handle decision making within the project?

ANSWER: Subject matter experts and stakeholders will be involved in the decision making. The Controller leadership team would approve business decisions.

28. Implementation Focused: Is there a PMO(Project Mgmt Office) or working group that will be assigned to the project?

ANSWER: The University does have a University IT program management office that would assist in implementation.

29. Implementation Focused: Do you plan to centralize processes across campuses or keep working as they are today?

ANSWER: Please see the answer to question 24.

30. Change Management: Do you have a change management or PMO team that can support the roll-out of a new solution?

ANSWER: yes, the University IT does have a PMO function that can assist.

31. User Focused: How many users will be involved in the processes to include all the functions described in RFP. This could include any employee or anyone requiring authentication in the system to include but not limited to: purchase requests, approvals, orders, solicitations, submission of expenses for reimbursement, paying suppliers, or anyone needing access to the S2P functions.

Requisition Access as a requisition creator, requester, or approver

Business Unit User Count

00730 533

00759 123

00765 121

00783 7

32. User Focused: How many total FTE employees are currently at:

○ UH Central

○ UH Downtown

○ UH Clear Lake

○ UH Victoria

ANSWER: s of 10/1/22

Campus Full time benefit eligible employees

UH Clear Lake 823

UH Downtown 1003

UH Main 5089

UH System 55

UH Victoria 410

Grand Total 7380

33. User Focused: How many suppliers do you have in your current system to be imported into the S2P system?

○ UH Central

○ UH Downtown

○ UH Clear Lake

○ UH Victoria

ANSWER:

FY22 Number of Suppliers per Campus tied to POs

Campus BU Number of suppliers

730 1,520

759 994

765 114

783 31

784 306

Grand Total 2,965

34. User Focused: What is the annual volume of POs?

○ UH Downtown

○ UH Clear Lake

○ UH Victoria

ANSWER

FY22 Number of PO's per Campus

Campus BU Number of PO's

730 4110

759 2248

765 269

35. User Focused: What is the annual volume of Invoices?

ANSWER: Vouchers should approximate invoices.

FY2022

Vouchers

Business Unit Tied to PO Not Tied to PO Grand Total

00730 17,714 73,530 91,244

00759 6,662 5,177 11,839

00765 968 2,991 3,959

00783 306 771 1,077

00784 3,772 8,298 12,070

Grand Total 29,422 90,767 120,189

36. User Focused: Does this table from RFP doc answer this question, (i.e. Vouchers = Invoices)

○ UH Downtown

○ UH Clear Lake

○ UH Victoria

ANSWER: Yes, vouchers should equate to invoices. Please view the more descriptive response to answer 35 above.

783 57

784 1039

Grand Total 7723

37. User Focused: What is the annual volume of payments?

○ UH Downtown

○ UH Clear Lake

○ UH Victoria

ANSWER: Annual payment volume based on number of vouchers are 120,189 payments.

38. User Focused: Who are your current bank partners?

ANSWER: Credit cards: Citibank and Payments: Bank of America

39. User Focused: What methods do you currently use or plan to use to pay suppliers?

○ Check

○ ACH

○ Wires

○ P-Card

○ Virtual Card

○ ANSWER:

■ Check: Yes

■ ACH: Yes

■ Wires: yes, for remittances outside of US.

■ P-Card, Yes

■ Virtual Card, Not used

40. User Focused: Do any of the institutions have interest in Contract Management capabilities to complete the synergy available in a Source to Pay solution?

ANSWER: The contract management is in the scope of the RFP. We understand that some S2P vendors incorporate some contract management functionality into e-procurement modules and some do not.

41. User Focused: If so, how many contract management users(this includes creators, editors, and approvers) will be using the CLM Solution? Usually this is a number between 20-100 for institutions your size.

■ UH Central

■ UH Downtown

■ UH Clear Lake

■ UH Victoria

ANSWER: Undetermined at this time.

42. User Focused: Would any of the UHS institutions like to consider Travel and Expense Management solutions, or an Expense only solution, as part of the Source to Pay project?

ANSWER: Travel and related expense management is outside the scope of this project.

43. Contracting: Is the UH System open to considering existing cooperative contracts with pre-negotiated pricing in which the UHS institutions are members?

ANSWER: The University is conducting an RFP. An S2P vendor that has an existing cooperative contract may submit its cooperative pricing as a response to the RFP. The University is aware of S2P vendors having cooperative contracts and determined that it would be beneficial to conduct an RFP to determine the best value for the System.

44. In 2.6 Key Events Schedule - Can UH provide an estimated kick-off date to start the E- Procurement implementation?

ANSWER: The project kick off date would be determined after RFP award. The University anticipates timely project planning soon after the contract is bilaterally signed.

45. In 6.2 Services to be Performed - Can UH provide an estimated user count by campus?

46. In 6.2 Services to be Performed - Can UH provide the total supplier count by campus?

FY22 Number of Suppliers per Campus tied to POs

Campus BU Number of suppliers

730 1,520

759 994

765 114

783 31

784 306

Grand Total 2,965

47. Are some of these suppliers common ones shared by campuses?

ANSWER: Yes,

48. If yes, how many?

ANSWER: We were unable to determine this in the time allotted to respond.

49. In 6.2 Services to be Performed - Please provide estimated number of contracts and POs that UH plans to migrate to the future E-Procurement system ANSWER: Unable to provide the number of contracts at this time as contract management is decentralized.

50. In 6.2 Services to be Performed - is UH currently using a third party solution and/or service to process manual invoices?

ANSWER: Concur is used for Travel and would not be integrated. Payment Works is used to validate supplier information. Payment works is not integrated with PeopleSoft and would not be integrated with the S2P system. The Uniform Statewide Accounting System is used for state voucher processing.

51. If yes, does UH expect the future E-Procurement system to integrate with the third party solution / service?

ANSWER: No, not at this time.

52. In 6.2 Services to be Performed - is UH using any third party e-signature tool such as AdobeSign or DocuSign?

ANSWER: Yes, the University uses DocuSign.

53. In Exhibit G - Source to Pay eProcurement.xlsx - Will UH include Contract Life Cycle requirements as referenced in the RFP page 24?

ANSWER: The University would requests catalog pricing for Contract Life Cycle requirements.

During procurement planning activities, we determined that some S2P vendors incorporate contract life cycle functionality into its e procurement modules.

54. How many users will be using will be using the sourcing solution?

User Definitions -

• Power Users: Users with the ability to create and/or edit and/or view and/or approve and/or collaborate and/or score sourcing events - Create, edit, view and export reports based upon user profiles and access rights ANSWER: University of Houston central campus has 10 purchasing employees that will facilitate projects. Generally, source selection committees are comprised of 5 to 7 employees in addition to the purchasing employee.

55. How many power users will be using the contract management solution?

User Definitions Power Users: Users with the ability to

• Create/ Edit/ View Contracts & Reports

• Red-line/ Approve/ Search Contracts

• Create & Receive Contract Expiry Notifications

• Create/ Receive Milestones & Notifications

• Export Reports

• Create Contract Templates

• Create/ Approve Contract Request ANSWER: Unable to determine at this time.

56. How many total contracts need to be migrated to our system?

ANSWER: This is not known at this time.

57. Are these electronic or paper contracts?

ANSWER: Generally, contracts are digitized in .pdf format.

58. Do you need integration with DocuSign/Echosign for esignature? (Note: We have inbuilt esignature capabilities out-of-box included as a standard functionality) ANSWER: Integration with DocuSign is preferred.

59. Does the University have any exsisiting relationship with Docusign/ Adobesign Docusign?

ANSWER: The University utilizes DocuSign.

60. How many power users will be using the Supplier System?

Requisition Access as a requisition creator, requester, or approver

Business Unit User Count

00730 533

00759 123

00765 121

00783 7

61. How many procurement users?

ANSWER: See response to answer 60.

62. Do you subscribe to any 3rd parties to augment your supplier data for DEI, today?

ANSWER: No

63. What is the current process and system being used for Sourcing, Contracting, Source-to-Pay and Spend analysis today?

ANSWER: Sourcing is manual and utilizes MS Word and MS Excel RFPs are posted to the State of Texas Comptroller’s website: ESBD. Purchasing is conducted using PeopleSoft 9.2 functionality.

64. What are the major challenges associated with it?

ANSWER: Primary issue is the processes are manual and labor intensive and do not provide data useful for spend analytics.

65. For S2P, please specify supplier quantity, regions, total spend amount for a yearly average?

ANSWER: We are unable to respond to this question.

66. Is there any preference or restriction for team location?

ANSWER: The University prefers teams to be located in the United States.

67. Can all implementation process be remote?

ANSWER: Generally, yes, implementation can be remote.

68. Does the customer requires local presence?

ANSWER: No, meetings maybe conducted virtually.

69. Do we need to partner to fulfill customer's requirement?

ANSWER: No, the vendor can self perform the implementation and integration. Per the RFP HUB subcontracting is desirable with a goal of 21.1%.

70. What applications will require integration?

ANSWER: PeopleSoft 9.2, DocuSign

71. What directions do those integrations have (ERP to Software or Software to ERP or both)? How do those applications to be integrated interacts with the different processes that our solution will support?

ANSWER: This answer depend entirely on the vendor’s software solution and would definitely include from Solution on ERP and may include from ERP to Solution.

72. If possible, please provide a System Map that considers apps to be integrated, locations and geographies (where are the apps installed and what geographies do they attend?)

ANSWER: We do not have this available currently.

73. Please let us know if we can support this project using offshore resources and sending data offshore while meeting the UHS security protocols.

ANSWER: Please see the answer to question 1.

74. Please provide a project organizational chart of how each entity (UH Central Campus, UHCL, UHD, and UHV) will be involved in the execution of this implementation, especially with regards to business requirements gathering / design, UAT, and Go-Live.

ANSWER: Each campus would provide a Program Manager that would be responsible to engage the appropriate stakeholders and subject matter experts. Generally, IT would be involved in system issues and Finance/Purchasing would be involved in the business decisions. A specific project organization chart would be developed during project scoping.

75. Will the System provide a PM responsible for gathering requirements, scheduling meetings, organizing activities, and obtaining sign-off across entities?

ANSWER: Yes

76. If yes, how will the System approach design differences?

ANSWER: The University anticipates that there may be design differences. Each campus would determine its willingness to modify procedures.

77. If no, would you like the implementation team to provide a PMO to manage all functional (nontechnical) activities related to the implementation of the solution, including those listed above?

ANSWER: Proposers should provide cost estimates to provide PMO function.

78. Since each entity (UH Central Campus, UHCL, UHD, and UHV) can determine which modules they will purchase, is the System expecting a different instance of software for each entity or will they share a single instance?

ANSWER: The answer depends on the vendor’s capabilities.

79. If single instance, will there be configuration difference between each entity?

ANSWER: A configuration difference may be required.

80. If expecting different instances, will there be integration between instances for a holistic view?

ANSWER: No, at this time each campus has its own purchasing/procurement function. This may change in the future.

81. Is there a deadline by which the entities must decide to purchase a module (e.g. by end of design phase)?

ANSWER: No, there is not a deadline.

82. If not, how will new requirements be addressed post design sign off?

ANSWER: The University is seeking catalog pricing for the S2P software modules to include license, implementation, integration, maintenance, and support.

83. Do you have a preference to Go-Live approach (e.g. big-bang, by entity, by BU, by module)?

ANSWER: Prefer implementation by module by campus.

84. Please provide detail regarding the level of standardization within in each entity (UH Central Campus, UHCL, UHD, and UHV) and across entities for each of the S2P processes: category management, strategic sourcing, contract management, supplier management, catalog management, requisitioning, order management, invoice processing, and payment.

ANSWER: There is not required process standardization. There is a standard regarding requirements that are addressed in the UHS Purchasing Guidelines, which is available on the UH Purchasing website.

85. Will the System require support standardizing processes prior to implementation?

ANSWER: As each University is a separate entity, standardizing may or may not be possible on any given procedure.

86. How will change be managed for the implementation?

ANSWER: Processes maps would need to be created and routed to stakeholders to approve.

87. Will the implementation have dedicated resources who will be responsible for change management throughout the engagement, including assessing organizational impact, readiness, and risk, managing stakeholders, drafting and issuing communication, and measuring adoption?

ANSWER: The University will have a PMO function to assist in communicating to the University.

88. Please describe how your sourcing, procurement, contracting, receiving, and accounts payable business units are organized. Are they centralized, decentralized?

ANSWER: Each University has its own souring, procurement, and accounts payable function.

Legal services for business contracts is centralized. Sourcing is conducted by each University Purchasing Department. The AP function is centralized at University of Houston Central Campus. The department that ordered goods is responsible for receiving the goods and issuing a voucher under a 2-way match.

89. Do UH provide any shared services?

ANSWER: University of Houston does provide an in-house print shop, as well as facilities maintenance and repairs.

90. We understand that PeopleSoft 9.2 is the ERP/Financial System. Please confirm if the System will require integrations with PeopleSoft.

ANSWER: Yes, the S2P system must integrate with PeopleSoft.

91. Will you require intergrations for PO, Receipt, and Payment data at the time of generation and correction?

ANSWER: If the vendor’s solution requires it.

92. Please let us know if you require any other integrations.

ANSWER: None that were not already specified.

93. It appears that there was a zoom meeting listed for today, would you happen to have a recording of that meeting for us to review?

ANSWER: The non-mandatory pre-bid meeting was not recorded but we did post the slide-deck and Sign-in Sheet on the ESBD.

http://www.txsmartbuy.com/esbddetails/view/RFP783-22013 http://www.txsmartbuy.com/esbddetails/view/RFP783-22013