Supply of STRATUM software

Description

Supply of STRATUM software This is a voluntary ex ante transparency notice for the Open University's intention to award a contract. The Open University (OU) intends to award a contract for 2 years with an option of further annual extensions up a maximum of five years in total for the maintenance of its current alumni, donor, and business engagement customer relationship management system (Current application STRATUM). The STRATUM application is owned, supplied and supported exclusively by ClearCourse, a company which specialises in software membership and external relationship management. Lot 1: This is a voluntary ex ante transparency notice for the Open University's intention to award a contract. The Open University (OU) intends to award a contract for 2 years with an option of further annual extensions up a maximum of five years in total for the maintenance of its current alumni, donor, and business engagement customer relationship management system (Current application STRATUM). The STRATUM application is owned, supplied and supported exclusively by ClearCourse, a company which specialises in software membership and external relationship management. The OU has identified that this is currently the only viable option to deliver major external compliance requirements and meet income generation targets in the areas of industry research and philanthropy, whilst maintaining the current core business that is achievable within the OU's capital and revenue budget and staff capacity. Since the system was installed some years ago, the OU has made substantial investment in STRATUM terms of process, infrastructure, staff skills and capabilities. The suite of software provides a range of capabilities developed specifically for the OU, including a research management system, legacy management system and preference centre. Upgrades have provided a staff and alumni portal which is driven from the data held in the STRATUM database and in, further development of online giving pages and payment system for alumni has also recently taken place. The STRATUM application has also required the OU to make additional substantial investment in terms of integrations into the rest of the OU's technical estate (which is complex and contains a number of bespoke legacy systems), the finance system and a separate data warehouse. The OU has identified that for reasons of technical complexity, compatibility, continuity, the need to minimise disruption to core business and the need to introduce greater resilience for existing systems, that only the products, services and support provided by ClearCourse are capable of meeting the OU's requirement. It is envisaged that the maximum value of the contract will be 500,000 GBP.