Agency Human Services Dept

Contractor InnoSoul Inc

SWIFT Contract Number 205177

Project Name METS & ISDS Middleware/Product – System Administrator

Project Number (if applicable) {Empty}

Summarize purpose of the contract, including why it was necessary: This RFO for two System Admins was intended to augment state staff as Integration/Middleware Administrators. The team is needed to support ongoing, highly visible projects to successful completion, enabling multiple ISDS technical solutions to be deployed and fully operational. These include several cross-agency projects with key collaborators from MNsure, MN.IT and the State Department of Human Services (DHS). Many of these solutions are deployed into existing, large scale computer systems.
The contractors developed flexible and efficient plans and collaborate with matrixed project teams with multiple priorities while simultaneously fostering an environment of team building and coordination.
A large portion of ongoing responsibilities revolved around interpreting and mitigating security vulnerability reports generated by internal scans as well as partnered audits. Mitigation strategies ranged from standard patching planning to highly technical solutions implemented at the middleware, web server, or load balancer level. Contracted admins were responsible for directly implementing solutions at all tiers.
Deployment and testing activities in these environments were facilitated by the contractors who offered the hands-on operation of highly specific IBM middleware titles hosting state-developed applications.

Project Duration

Start Date Sat, 01/01/2022 - 00:00

Original end date Sat, 12/31/2022 - 00:00

Actual end date Sun, 12/31/2023 - 00:00

Did project finish on time? Yes

Total billable hours utilized (if applicable) 4096

Contract Amounts

Original contract: $451000

Amendments $451000

Contract total $902000

Did project finish within budget? Yes

What was the funding source? - 2.5% to 47034 (METS Ops Private)
- 70% to 47036 (METS Ops Pub/Priv)
- 10% to 47059 (ISDS Ops-Medicaid Elig/SMRT)
- 17.5% to 47103 (MMIS Dev-Gen-Middleware)

Is this a sole source contract? No

If this was a single source contract, explain why the agency determined there was only a single source for the services (if applicable) {Empty}

Evaluator Name Levi Reynolds

Evaluator Email Address levi.reynolds@state.mn.us

Evaluate the contractor's timeliness The contracted staff were always timely, often providing last-minute coverage for front-line operational tasks as they arose.

InnoSoul (vendor) was also reliable about replying to questions about billing or other administrative issues.

Evaluate the contractor's quality Hari and Sridhar are top-tier technicians and jump on new challenges whenever available. The METS system has been noticed in recent years for its great improvements in reliability, and these two technicians have played key pieces in that.

Evaluate the contractor's cost For the quality of work, the cost is good value

Evaluate the contractor's overall performance I'm very happy with these two contractors. With their help, we have been able to keep up with various critical upgrades (normal for a system built from this many titles) at the same time as greatly improving our systems' security vulnerability footprints over the past year.

Would you engage the contractor's services again? Yes

Describe any negative action taken during the duration of this contract (i.e., termination, pursuit of suspension, etc.): None to think of

Please rate the overall experience with the contractor 5 - very satisfied