Grand County 2025 VMI RFP Final.pdf

Grand County Information Technologies ~ 308 Byers Ave, Hot Sulphur Springs, CO 80451

REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS

Virtual Machine Infrastructure

MARCH 2025

Request for Proposal – Grand County Information Systems

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CONTENTS

1. PURPOSE AND OVERVIEW

2. SCOPE OF WORK

Vendor Information Collection and Analysis

Vendor Proposal Preparation

Grand County Proposal Review and Selection

Contract Review and Award

Solution Deployment Project Planning

Hot Sulphur Springs Deployment and Integration

Hot Sulphur Springs Migration and Training

Hot Sulphur Springs Normal Operations and Support

Granby Deployment and Integration

Granby Relocation, Migration, and Normal Operations

Project Acceptance and Closure

3. INVOICING AND PAYMENT REQUIREMENTS

4. MAINTENANCE AND SUPPORT REQUIREMENTS

5. VENDOR SUPPORT PORTAL REQUIREMENTS

6. TRAINING REQUIREMENTS

7. SOLUTION TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

8. CURRENT VMI PLATFORM OVERVIEW

Current VMI Information

9. PROPOSAL INSTRUCTIONS

Proposal Format

10. PROPOSAL CONFIDENTIALITY

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REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS (RFP)

Grand County Virtual Machine Infrastructure 2025

Grand County Government of Grand County, Colorado (“Grand County”) is requesting proposals from qualified Solution Providers (“Vendor”) for a new Virtual Machine Infrastructure for the County.

The Scope of Work section of this Request for Proposal (“RFP”) describes the products and services required for this project. Proposals shall be submitted as instructed in the Proposal Instructions Section of this RFP, and will be accepted by Grand County until July 1, 2025. Proposals shall follow the requirements defined in PROPOSAL INSTRUCTIONS and may be delivered by physical mail to:

Grand County Government Information Systems 308 Byers Ave Hot Sulphur Springs, CO 80451 Attn: Infrastructure

RE: 2025 VMI RFP

If delivered by physical mail, the proposal must arrive prior to July 1, 2025.

Each proposal shall be valid until March 1, 2026 to allow for annual budgeting and purchasing timelines. The technical proposals shall be retained by Grand County Government and will not be returned.

Grand County Government retains the right to reject any and all proposals, to waive any non-conformance in the proposals received, and to accept the proposal deemed most advantageous to the best interest of Grand County Government. Late submittals may not be considered.

Requests for clarification concerning the RFP shall be submitted to the Grand County Information Systems Infrastructure Team.

Requests received after July 1, 2025 may not be addressed.

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PURPOSE AND OVERVIEW

For the purposes of this RFP we will refer to the compute and storage environment as Virtual Machine Infrastructure (VMI). Grand County currently uses an on-premise VMI which is located in Hot Sulphur Springs, Colorado and consists of VMware vSAN, Dell PowerEdge, Exagrid, and Veeam solutions.

Grand County is seeking to migrate our current on-premise VMI platform and associated services to a new platform which improves capabilities and services at our Hot Sulphur Springs (primary) and Granby (secondary/disaster) locations. The proposed solution is required to be modern, scalable, resilient, cost-effective, secure, and operationally uncomplicated.

SCOPE OF WORK

The specific tasks, deliverables, timelines, and expectations are grouped into the following stages:

· Vendor Information Collection and Analysis (until June 1, 2025)

· Vendor Proposal Preparation (proposals due July 1, 2025)

· Grand County Proposal Review and Selection (September 1, 2025)

· Contract Review and Award (begin January 1, 2026)

· Solution Deployment Project Planning (estimated February 2026)

· Hot Sulphur Springs Deployment and Integration

· Hot Sulphur Springs Migration and Training

· Hot Sulphur Springs Normal Operations and Support (due July 1, 2026)

· Granby Deployment and Integration

· Granby Relocation, Migration, and Normal Operations (Q4 2026)

· Project Acceptance and Closure (Q4 2026)

If any of the above dates seems unachievable or if the evaluations as outlined may be completed sooner, please provide the anticipated completion dates in the Proposal.

Extended hours or after-hours work may be necessary to fulfill implementation requirements of the project, especially if there is an availability impact to production systems.

The following attachments provide addition information and requirements:

· Attachment A: Sample County Services Contract (PDF)

· Attachment B: Solution Requirements (Excel)

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Vendor Information Collection and Analysis Vendor will use the information in this RFP to develop a proposal that meets the defined requirements and expectations. If additional information is required, the Vendor shall contact tjohnson@co.grand.co.us. Grand County is willing to run limited data collections (i.e. collection scripts, work load analysis, etc.) using tools from reputable sources.

Vendor Proposal Preparation Vendor will use the requirements and expectations include in this RFP, and information collected, to create a proposal in accordance with the Proposal Instructions section.

Vendor will submit their proposal to Grand County no later than July 1, 2025 for consideration.

Grand County Proposal Review and Selection Grand County will review all proposals submitted by the deadline for fit and alignment with stated requirements and expectations. Grand County may contact Vendor for additional information and solution demonstrations as required. Grand County will use the following criteria for proposal evaluation and selection:

· Alignment with the RFP instructions, requirements, and expectations

· Qualifications of Vendor and their assigned personnel resources

· Responses collected by Grand County from Vendor supplied references

· Vendor post-deployment support structure and capabilities

· Vendor support site content and its ease-of-use

· Responsiveness of Vendor to requests

· Vendor proposed Project Plan completeness

· Vendor proposed training options

· Planned knowledge transfer during deployment

· Total cost of the deployment, to include any required external procurements

· Payment and Financing options

Grand County will provide notification of selection to Vendors by September 1, 2025 and reserves the right to reject any and all proposals or cancel this RFP without additional discussion. Grand County reserves the right to select the most qualified proposal pursuant to this RFP and the lowest cost proposal may not be the proposal selected.

Contract Review and Award Vendor will read and familiarize themselves with “Attachment A: County Services Contract” as it contains the legal provisions Grand County is expecting to be included within the Vendors contract.

Vendor will submit a contract to Grand County for review, redline, and execution.

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Work shall NOT commence until the contract is fully executed.

In the event of a conflict between this RFP and the fully executed contract, the fully executed contract shall govern.

Solution Deployment Project Planning Vendor will be expected to provide basic streamlined project management during the duration of deployment. Basic streamlined project management will be considered as:

· Vendor will assign a Project Manager for coordination and serve as the focal point for status updates.

· Project Manager will be responsible for the creation and update of a Project Schedule which will display high-level milestones, expected durations, and ownership.

· Project Manager will be responsible for the creation of a Project Closure Task List with criteria for closure and achievement status.

· Project Manager will provide weekly Project status updates to the project team.

· Grand County will provide input and support in the expectations identified above.

Hot Sulphur Springs Deployment and Integration The Vendor and Grand County will plan and conduct the deployment of the solution at the Hot Sulphur Springs location. The deployment plan will consist of the following:

· Acquiring all hardware and software licenses for the solution.

· Installation and base configuration of solution. This will include ensuring all the hardware and software is updated to current compatible versions, security controls are configured, the base solution is tested and validated to ensure there are no hardware and software issue preventing normal operations.

· Integrations to Grand County backup, management, and monitoring capabilities will be conducted and validated.

· Specific configurations necessary for the solution to be operationally ready for migrations from the existing VMI and assume normal operations once migration has occurred.

Hot Sulphur Springs Migration and Training The Vendor and Grand County will develop a comprehensive migration plan to adequately communicate, provide hands-on training, and transfer workloads from the existing VMI to the new solution. The migration methodology used is required to minimize downtime and ensure data integrity of migrated workloads.

The Vendor will facilitate a structured knowledge transfer that enables Grand County to develop expertise that allows assumption of responsibilities for daily operations and the ability to be the primary owner of conducting migrations to the Granby located solution.

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This knowledge transfer should include side-by-side working sessions during key configuration activities and mentoring during the early operational phase.

Knowledge transfer should be documented through detailed runbooks, operational guides, diagrams, and configuration documentation specific to our implementation.

Vendors should describe their approach to knowledge transfer and provide examples of documentation from previous projects.

Hot Sulphur Springs Normal Operations and Support Grand County will assume operational ownership of the Hot Sulphur Springs located solution. The Vendor will provide an enhanced support escalation path for a period of at least two weeks from “Go-Live” to ensure Grand County has timely expert-level Vendor support for operational concerns and issues.

Granby Deployment and Integration Solution deployment to the Granby location is dependent on new building construction completion (tentatively scheduled for Q4 2026). To ensure flexibility and responsiveness, Grand County proposes deploying the Granby solution temporarily at the Hot Sulphur Springs location to validate solution and functionality. Vendor is expected to provide proper training to enable Grand County to relocate the solution once the new facility and appropriate infrastructure is available. The Vendor and Grand County will develop a comprehensive plan to operationally validate the solution prior to its deployment to Granby and the necessary activities required to ensure proper transfer of the solution to Granby once the facility and associated infrastructure are available.

Granby Relocation, Migration, and Normal Operations Grand County, utilizing the aforementioned plan and training, will relocate the solution to Granby and conduct the appropriate workload migrations. Grand County will utilize the standard support capabilities provided by the Vendor for questions or issues that may arise during the relocation and migration. Grand County will ensure snapshot and recovery testing are occurring as expected from a performance and functional perspective. Once the solution has been validated, Grand County will assume operational ownership at the Granby location.

Project Acceptance and Closure Vendor and Grand County will validate all entries on the Project Closure Task List have been accomplished and mutually agree that the project can be closed.

INVOICING AND PAYMENT REQUIREMENTS

Grand County will accept invoices with a payment term of NET 30 or greater for materials and services upon successful delivery. Grand County is tax exempt.

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MAINTENANCE AND SUPPORT REQUIREMENTS

The Vendor will provide support, licensing, and maintenance costs within the proposal for a period of five (5) years from date of implementation. This support will include:

· 24/7 hardware and software support with a 4-hour response

· Proactive hardware monitoring and Vendor response

· Next Business Day shipment of replacements for failed hardware

· A named primary and secondary Account Manager

· A single-point of contact for support

VENDOR SUPPORT PORTAL REQUIREMENTS

The Vendor should have a support portal that provides a user-friendly interface, self-service tools, and secure access to information, including a comprehensive knowledge base, support ticket submission, and optionally a community forum. Grand County will require a demonstration of the Vendor support portal prior to final proposal selection.

TRAINING REQUIREMENTS

The Vendor must provide comprehensive training for Grand County staff to ensure they develop the skills necessary to effectively manage and maintain the solution. Training should include both formal classroom instruction and hands-on configuration exercises covering all aspects of system administration. Training can be provided in person or virtually, ahead of or after deployment.

Training curriculum should address day-to-day administrative tasks, performance optimization, troubleshooting procedures, and disaster recovery operations. Vendors should provide detailed information about their training approach, including duration, delivery methods, cost, materials provided, and instructor qualifications.

SOLUTION TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

The proposed solution must integrate with existing infrastructure components including network systems, backup platforms (Veeam), monitoring tools, and security systems.

Vendors should detail their approach to system integration, including any required configuration changes to existing systems and any potential compatibility challenges.

The Vendor will assist with integrating enterprise authentication methods such as LDAP or Active Directory at the time of deployment. Vendors will identify any third-party integration tools or services required to ensure proper operation of the complete environment. The vendor will identify how the solution aligns to the following requirements:

· Highly available architecture

· Centralized management and monitoring

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· Integrates with Microsoft Active Directory

· Compatibility with Microsoft SQL Server and Failover Clustering (VM)

· Compatibility with a Veeam and ExaGrid backup solution

· Provides for patching and upgrades of firmware and management software

· Manages and allocates GPU resources to virtual machines

CURRENT VMI PLATFORM OVERVIEW

The active production environment consists of approximately 60 virtualized Windows and Linux servers running in a VMware vSAN platform. The County wishes to migrate to a new and unified Virtual Machine Infrastructure solution. The proposed solution should be viable and useable by Grand County for a period of at least five (5) years.

Current VMI Information

· Hypervisor: VMware 8 vSAN o No DRS

· Nodes: Four (4) Dell R740xd Physical Servers

· Virtual Machines: ~60 running Microsoft Windows Server, Ubuntu Linux, and OVF

· CPU: 80 cores @ 2.2Ghz (176GHz total ~65% used)

· RAM: 1.5TB (~60% used)

· Storage (IOPS @ 95% ~3,412) o vSAN: 25TB in use o iSCSI: 25TB in use

· Users: ~340

· Multi VLAN Network: 1Gbps LAN and 10Gbps Core

· Copper Ethernet

· 8U+ Available Rack Space

· Veeam BDR and Exagrid

PROPOSAL INSTRUCTIONS

Hard copy proposals may be submitted in a sealed package with one (1) original and preferably one (1) electronic copy in PDF format on a compact disc or USB Drive of the technical proposal and shall be enclosed in a sealed package marked “Proposal”. Each package shall be legibly marked in the upper left-hand corner with the name and address of the Vendor.

In lieu of hard-copy proposals, electronic submittals may be sent to tjohnson@co.grand.co.us

All proposals will conform to the Proposal Format section of this RFP.

Grand County reserves the right and full discretion to reject any or all proposals, on grounds including without limitation due to Grand County financial or technical needs and reserves the right to reject any or all nonconforming, nonresponsive, unbalanced or

Page | 9 conditional proposals and to reject the proposal of any Vendor if Grand County believes that it would not be in the best interest of Grand County to make an award to that Vendor, whether because the proposal is not responsive or the consultant is unqualified or of doubtful financial ability or fails to meet any other pertinent standard or criteria established by Grand County.

Proposal Format Proposal submittals shall be clear, accurate, and comprehensive so that Grand County personnel are able to understand and determine the proposal validity. The proposal should conform to the latest Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) at levels A and AA. Vendors are expected to provide specific and concise answers to all questions and requests for information. Indirect, imprecise, or incomplete responses will negatively impact analysis and review. Generic marketing, excessive, or irrelevant material is highly discouraged.

Submittals shall be limited to twenty (20) pages; exclusive of cover letter, front and back covers, title page, section dividers and resumes.

Submittals should be organized and numbered in the preferred order presented below:

COVER PAGE

SECTION 1: Company History and Background with General Response to RFP.

Include a brief history of the company and provide any background information that may be relevant to the solution being sought in this RFP.

SECTION 2: Project Approach.

Provide a summary and approach to completing the project, including addressing the expectations contained within this RFP, and any additional anticipated issues and proposed strategies for addressing the issues based on additional insight, capabilities and/or perspectives of the Vendor.

SECTION 3: Project Team Qualifications.

Proposed project team including Project Manager, technical resources, support staff, and proposed sub-consultants (as required). For each key team member, define their specific roles, location and time commitment to the project, and briefly identify their experience and qualifications. Include a team organizational chart. It is the responsibility of the Vendor to ensure that the team proposed for this project is available to meet the project commitments, and it is expected that key personnel identified in the proposal will remain on the project through its entire duration.

SECTION 4: Summary of Similar Projects.

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Include a minimum of two (2) similar example projects (government references preferred), including client references, that the Vendor has completed within the past two (2) years that demonstrate the experience of the proposed team members to satisfy the scope of work. Additional project information may be provided and should include whether the project was completed on time and within budget per the original schedule and budget. Any discrepancies shall be explained.

SECTION 5: Proposed Solution.

Include a clear and concise description of the solution being proposed, how that solution aligns to the requirements and expectations provided within this RFP and associated attachments.

Provide a clear and concise itemized listing of all components to include a brief description, quantity, and total cost. Group any “optional” components and services after all required components and services have been listed.

Costs will cover a five-year lifecycle of the solution to include all hardware, software, support, maintenance, and licensing.

A fully Vendor completed “Attachment B: Solution Requirements (Excel)” will be provided as a separate document accompanying the Vendor proposal.

PROPOSAL CONFIDENTIALITY

All Proposals will become the sole property of the County. All Proposals and related documents become a matter of public record, with the exception of those parts of a Proposal which are trade secrets, as that term is defined by statute and which are identified by the Proposer as a protected trade secret. Grand County shall have no responsibility for identification of any trade secret material and no obligation to protect any information not identified as such.

If any part of a Proposal contains any trade secrets that the Responder does not want disclosed to the public, the Responder shall mark that part of the Proposal as a “trade secret.” The County, however, shall not in any way be liable or responsible for the disclosure of any Proposal or any part thereof if disclosure is required under the Colorado Open Records Act (C.R.S. 24-72-201, et seq.) or pursuant to law or legal process.

In addition, by submitting a Proposal, a Responder agrees to save, defend, keep, hold harmless, and fully indemnify the County, its elected officials, officers, employees, agents, and volunteers from all damages, claims for damages, costs, or expenses, whether in law or in equity, that may at any time arise or be set up for not disclosing a trade secret pursuant to the Public Records Act.

PROPOSAL CONFIDENTIALITY