Explanation
This legislation authorizes the Director of the Department of Technology (DoT) to enter into a two-year contract with OARnet/OSU, a non-profit organization, for VMWare software licensing, maintenance, and support services. The original agreement (EL011737) was authorized by ordinance 1716-2010, passed December 13, 2010. The agreement was most recently renewed by authority of ordinance 0887-2023, passed by Columbus City Council on April 26, 2023. The total cost associated with this ordinance is $916,566.52 for the coverage term period from April 2, 2024 to April 1, 2026.
Through the State of Ohio Virtualization Program, OARnet offers significant discounts on VMWare that are not available in the market place. As such, it is in the city’s best interests to procure VMWare through OARnet, rather than another procurement process. The pricing offered to the city reflects the agreed upon public sector discounts available to all participants in the State of Ohio Virtualization Program.
Server virtualization is the conversion of one physical server into multiple individual and isolated virtual storage spaces. This industry standard was adopted by the DoT in 2009 to reduce the costs of Data Center operations. This also reduces power consumption, cooling requirements, and provides further capabilities for recovery and availability of information systems. VMWare software is the core component that is needed in order to operate virtual servers that run critical applications for the enterprise such as Accela, CUBS, and 311.
This ordinance also authorizes the appropriation of $1,170,328.00 to the Department of Technology, Information Services Division, from the unappropriated cash balance of the Information Services Operating fund, pursuant to the projections outlined in DoT’s 3rd quarter 2023 review submission.
Additionally, this ordinance authorizes various transfers in the Information Services Division’s operating fund. As part of the 2023 third quarter financ...
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