District Firewall Solution

The School Board of Seminole County, Florida is conducting an Invitation to Negotiate (ITN) for a comprehensive District Firewall Solution targeting a robust Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) infrastructure. The procurement seeks three firewall appliances: an Active/Active High Availability pair for the Education Support Center data center and a standalone appliance for the Oviedo High School data center. The solution must support approximately 60,000 students, 8,000 staff, and 80,000-100,000 concurrent devices across two data centers with current internet bandwidth of 14 Gbps per site, expandable to 20 Gbps. Technical requirements include minimum processing capabilities of 175 Million packets per second, 100 Gbps IPsec VPN throughput, 30,000 concurrent SSL VPN users, and 70 Million concurrent TCP sessions. Evaluation will use an adjectival scoring system across six weighted criteria: Experience of Personnel (5%), Technical Approach (30%), Technical Support Services (15%), References (5%), Price Schedule (40%), and financial stability. Key dates include proposal submissions due January 5, 2026, at 1:00 PM EST, evaluation committee short-list meetings on January 21, 2026, oral presentations on January 29, 2026, and targeted board approval on March 10, 2026, with a project go-live no later than July 1, 2026.

The procurement does not specify specific set-aside designations for disadvantaged enterprises, but does require all equipment to be new Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) stock, with no used or refurbished equipment acceptable. The existing infrastructure consists of four FortiGate 4400F appliances and one FortiAnalyzer 3000G reporting appliance, which may be considered for reuse if compatible. Seven companies responded to the solicitation, with five submitting proposals: CDW Government LLC, Computers at Work, PC Solutions & Integration, Inc., TWC Holdings LLC, and United Data Technologies. The contract offers two pricing options: a three-year term with potential two-year renewal and a five-year upfront payment structure. While specific budget ranges are not explicitly stated, the pricing schedule indicates comprehensive costs covering hardware, software, licensing, VPN client licenses for 2,000 users, maintenance, professional services, implementation, data migration, administrator training, and 24/7/365 support. E-Rate program eligibility is built into the procurement, allowing potential federal funding for eligible components.