Florida to ink outsourcing deal

Florida plans to award a groundbreaking outsourcing project for information technology services to two firms later this summer, said Kim Bahrami, Florida's chief information officer. The award of the MyFlorida Alliance project will follow a 60-day period in which the state will validate the financial aspects of the contract it's negotiating with Accenture Ltd. of Hamilton, Bermuda, and BearingPoint Inc. of McLean, Va., Bahrami said in a June 6 interview. Bahrami heads the Florida State Technology Office. Under the proposed contract, Accenture will provide applications management in support of the state portal as well as manage the delivery of e-government services. BearingPoint will provide desktop management, e-government services and desktop services for maintaining and improving services delivered through the state technology office's data center. Bahrami declined to provide an estimated value of the contract, although research firms that track state government IT opportunities believe the seven-year project to be worth $80 million. The contract likely will be a mix of traditional time-and-materials and shared-risk plans, Bahrami said.