The Federal Government’s Digital Transformation Agency (DTA) has increased contract value to almost $3.9bn through streamlining its procurement processes over the last year.
ServiceNow in a media release issued on Monday said the The BuyICT portal has streamlined procurement by increasing contract value from AUD$700m to almost $3.9bn – an 82% increase in contract value.
Anthony Conway, Product Manager and Director of Sourcing Platforms from the Digital Transformation Agency said “The government procurement space is complex. ServiceNow helped us build a platform that is simple, fair, and fast to manage buying and selling, and also comply with rules and legislation.”
“The numbers speak for themselves,” Mr Conway adds. “We have facilitated 5,000 transactions in the last financial year alone.”
The BuyICT portal helps government buyers source ICT products and services, connect with suppliers and find resources.
In May this year the DTA shut down its Digital Marketplace and merged it with the BuyICT platform.
The BuyICT platform is now used by over 100 government agencies and 3,500 sellers, with centralised procurement pathways “consolidating government spending and minimising inefficiencies.
The DTA says in the last year it has facilitated more than a dozen requests for quotes per day via the platform on average. This includes 2,100 for hardware, 801 for software, 132 telecommunications and 98 cloud requests for quotes.
After coming under fire recently from the Australian National Audit Office, the success of BuyICT platform will provide a welcome reprieve for the DTA. An audit found weaknesses in the DTA’s governance, oversight and probity arrangements for procurements.
Before the introduction of the BuyICT platform digital procurement has been a manual process, with requests for quotes published via email, ServiceNow says.
Quotes were submitted via email and even physically to locked tender boxes. Contracts often required handwritten signatures.
“With the automated workflows, government buyers, including new hires who are less experienced in procurement, can literally just follow the automated process and fulfil compliance and accountability guidelines,” Mr Conway continues.
“Sellers can now submit quotes in minutes without guidance or instruction. We are seeing the same phenomenon with buyers, who are now receiving responses to complex quote requests within a day or two. That could have taken weeks in the past.”
Eric Swift, Vice President and Managing Director ANZ of ServiceNow says, “Improving public sector productivity means the government can do more with less. We are delighted that the ServiceNow platform helped increase the DTA’s efficiency through the introduction of seamless and automated digital processes.”
