2025-0255 Support for Engineering Voice Network (CTS) BELGIUM - 29 Aug

Please do  NOT  apply for any NATO contract positions unless you meet ALL the following criteria:

Any applications that do NOT meet all the above - and do not CLEARLY show these on the CV - will be deleted.

Introduction:

This Statement of Work (SoW) defines the objectives, scope of work and milestones required to be achieved by the company and the performance based contractor in regards to their role attached to the Network as a Service team. The expectation from the deliverables is to support the team that is responsible to deliver the Network, Voice and Video services via this SoW. The defined deliverables of this SOW require the contractor to participate in most of the tasks that the day to day work mandates, in order to ensure the effective and efficient service operation. Practical arrangements are described below, in accordance with what the above-mentioned team applies on a daily bases.

Background:

• The NATO Infrastructure Service Centre (NISC) provides generic, domain independent, technical functionality that enables and facilitates the operation and use of Information Technology resources. NISC services (including: subject matter expertise; acquisition; project management, operations and maintenance; and, disposal) are provided in the following technical domains: Network Services (to include routing, switching and transmission services), infrastructure hosting, storage and processing, infrastructure networking, HW and SW management, databases and web platform services, as well as identity management. Services, are provided throughout the lifecycle to both internal and external customers in both static and deployable settings.
• The Network as a Service (NaaS) Area of Responsibility (AoR) spans all network infrastructure hardware, Network Function Virtualization (NFV) elements, as well as software, services, management, and licensing components enabling the provisioning, deployment, network management, maintenance, lifecycle and vendor management of the on-premises, cloud and multi-cloud network infrastructure, services and connectivity.

Objectives:
The purpose of this SoW is to define the requirements on the deliverables that the bidding company should provide.
The NATO Communications and Information Agency (further referred to as "Purchaser") is seeking a qualified Service provider to provide efficient and effective deliverables that will be completed in form of tasks that include service operation support including but not limited to Incident and Service Request management, systems updates, troubleshooting and monitoring, participation in planned service improvement initiatives (those which will be referred as Service) for the Network as a Service team.
With this SoW, the Purchaser aims to achieve the following objectives:

• Leverage industry expertise and best practices in installation, configuration, monitoring and daily operation of commercial off the shelf (COTS) technologies and software in the collaboration area.
• Ensure healthy and functional backend environment providing to the devices end users consume the services with the security and functional requirements.
• Improve the fault tolerance and disaster recovery of the IT systems by implementing continuous service improvement initiatives, thus enhancing the overall business continuity.
• Improve the maturity of the IT Operations by standardizing and optimizing activities and documenting procedures.

To achieve these objectives, the Purchaser is looking for qualified Voice Network engineer with estimation that the contract period will require, work effort that is equal to 1 resource.
During performance of the contract, the Contractor personnel will act as part of the Purchaser's IT support organization.
 
Scope of Work:
The SOW covers the following activities and tasks to be executed:
Incident Management:

• Provide prompt, professional, and effective resolution of technical issues (including incidents) escalated from Level 2 and (in some cases) Level 3 support and end users on all security domains for all encompassed Area of Responsibility (AOR) of the Service;
• Liaise with other teams in troubleshooting technical issues at various levels (network, backend, frontend, firewalls)
• Perform root cause analysis in order to reduce repeating/recurring technical issues

Request Fulfillment:

• Implement approved service requests and change requests (e.g. creation of new resources/configuration items, alteration of existing resources/configuration items).

Maintenance:

• Implement security measures (patches, updates, etc..) on the systems manually with no to minimal downtime.
• Perform all administration and maintenance tasks required at the backend and frontend as a Subject Matter Expert to ensure the availability, continuity and optimum performance.
• Bring the backend systems (and if software exists also frontend devices) to the latest software version released by the vendor and approved by NATO authorities

On-Call Duties:

• Certain periods of the contract period, to be decided by the unit manager, be ready and available after workhours during the week and the whole day during the weekend to be ready to provide support and resolve technical issues on all security domains for all encompassed Area of Responsibility.

Continual Service Improvement:

• Improve backend and frontend maintenance activities; monitoring tools and implementation of security measures resulting in minimal to no service interruption.
• Continuously improve the quality and efficiency of IT services by monitoring and maintaining healthy backend and frontend environment thus reducing the need for support.
• Identify and provide opportunities for continuous service improvements. Activities and tasks mentioned above will either have combinations or single focus based on the requirements of the organization at each Work Package.

Requirements:
General Requirements:

• The contractor shall manage and be responsible for all Contractor personnel.
• The Contractor's personnel shall be knowledgeable and experienced in the nature of the tasks and activities of the Service.
• The Contractor's personnel shall possess valid Personal Security Clearances for the duration of the Contract performance.
• The Contractor's personnel shall be courteous and professional in dealing with NATO and Purchaser's staff.
• 8.1.5. The Contractor's personnel shall have sufficient knowledge in English language to allow smooth verbal and written communication.
• The Contractor's shall strive to lower the rotation of personnel and maintain the same staff working under this SoW.
• The Contractor shall seek Purchaser's approval prior to appointing new personnel to work under this Statement of Work.
• The Purchaser will support the Contractor's personnel with access to the IT systems as required. The Contractor shall submit requests for change of Contractor's personnel at least 30 days in advance.
• The Contractor shall handle the Purchaser's furnished equipment (PFE) with due care.
• The Contractor shall operate the equipment following the manufacturer's requirements.
• The Contractor shall minimize the impact to the end users during the execution of the work.
• The Contractor shall bring immediately to the attention of the Purchaser Point of Contact any issues preventing the execution of the work.
• The Contractor's personnel will report to and receive guidance from Purchaser Point of Contact on-site, Service Owner and assigned immediate supervisor.
• The Contractor's personnel shall follow local site procedures to obtain physical unescorted access to the assigned work position and logical access to the networks in scope.
• The Contractor's personnel shall liaise with other Purchasers' support teams as necessary.
• The Contractor's personnel shall use the Purchaser Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) ticketing system following the Purchaser's procedures and observe relevant KPIs.

Constraints:

• All the deliverables provided under this statement of work will be based on Purchaser templates or agreed with the Purchaser's Point of contact.
• All scripts, documentation, etc. will be stored under configuration management and/or in the provided Purchaser tools and systems.
• Part of the work will involve handling classified networks, therefore, a valid security clearance at NATO COSMIC TOP SECRET level is required for the Contractor's staff undertaking this project.
• Due to the high security profile of the work to be carried out, there is a requirement for traceability and accountability, the criticality of the information Contractor's staff will have access to (voice mailboxes, voice user accounts, VTC Accounts and VTC Sessions of VIPs, Skype phones, etc..) demands that all the 12 Work Packages during the performance period must start and end with the same staff as long as there are no grounds for rotation or termination.

Specfic Requirements:
Purchaser's key roles:
The following personnel is considered Key personnel in the context of this SoW:
Service Owner - the person accountable for the end-to-end delivery of the IT services. Unless decided otherwise, the Service Owner is the Purchaser's designated representative to sign the acceptance documents under this SoW.
Service Delivery Manager - the person responsible for delivering the assigned IT service(s) on a day-to-day basis.
Section Head - the person responsible for the engineering cell.
Same person may perform more than one role.
 
Contractor's key roles:

• The Contractor shall assign a project (or service) manager for the duration of the work under this SoW.
• The Contractor's Project Manager shall be the single point of contact for any matters related to this SoW.
• The Contractor shall strive to maintain the same person for as long as possible.
• The Contractor shall seek Purchaser's approval prior to appointing new Project Manager. When the reasons to appoint a new Project Manager are beyond Contractor's control, the Contractor shall inform the Purchaser at least 30 days in advance.

Escalation:
For matters related to this SoW except contractual matters, the Contractor shall follow the escalation procedures as follows:

• The first point of contact is the Purchaser's site point of contact.
• The first escalation point is the Purchaser's Service Delivery Manager.
• The second escalation point is the Purchaser's Service Owner.

The Contractor shall escalate all contractual matters as per the Contract General and Special provisions to the Purchaser Contracting Officer and inform the Service Owner.
 
Requirements:

• Part of the work will involve handling classified networks, therefore, a valid security clearance at NATO COSMIC TOP SECRET level is required for the Contractor's staff undertaking this project.

Specific  Requirements:
To efficiently and effectively deliver the Service, the Contractor personnel shall possess at a minimum qualifications and skills in the following areas:

• Advanced proficiency and 3+ years experience with Cisco Voice Technologies: Problem solving, strong knowledge of Cisco Voice Technologies such as Cisco CUCM, Cisco CUBE, Cisco UCCX, Diagnose and resolve technical issues, support software and basic associated network related problems.
• Advanced proficiency and 3+ years experience with Telecommunication Technology including TDM: Knowledge of managing call distribution lists, voice mailboxes, ISDN, TDM technologies, troubleshooting on Legacy TDM PABX integration to Cisco Voice Technologies
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with Virtualized server platform products: Good knowledge in managing VMWare vSphere and VMWare vCenter
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with Communication Systems integration with PKI and Active Directory: Good knowledge in AD and PKI integration with Cisco products
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with monitoring platforms and protocols: Good knowledge of monitoring platforms such as nGeniusOne, CA Performance management, CA Spectrum
• Basic proficiency and 1+ years experience with Scripting: Basic knowledge in Java Script, Python or similar scripting languages
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with Networks: Knowledge in troubleshooting basic network issues (including boundary protection devices) on servers and end users; Splunk log monitoring and analysis, nGeniusOne monitoring and analysis.
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with Exercise/Military Operations Support (desirable): Knowledge and experience either working with or being in the military IT capacity specialized on Telephony service products (Cisco, legacy PABX, etc..) delivering support of exercises or operations; Knowledge of use case scenarios of Telephony service products (Cisco,  legacy PABX, etc..) in exercise and operations as well as day to day operational requirements of military bodies
• Intermediate proficiency and 2+ years experience with Remote Support Units (desirable): Knowledge and experience either working with or being in a remote support unit IT capacity specialized on Telephony service products (Cisco, legacy PABX, etc..) delivering support to daily activities, exercises or operations; Knowledge of use case scenarios of Telephony service products (Cisco, legacy PABX, etc..) in remote support units exercise and operations support as well as remote units supporting day to day operational requirements support of military bodies