Released on March 2, 2016
The Government of Saskatchewan has awarded a five-year, $38 million dollar information technology deal to WBM Office Systems, a Saskatchewan-based company with offices in Regina and Saskatoon. WBM won the tender on the basis of “best value” that the government recently made the standard for those ministries that previously selected on the basis of lowest cost.“The work we do every day at WBM is all about advancing the role that technology is playing in helping our clients to succeed, and in doing so, it is so exciting to see the careers and lives of so many people being built right here in Saskatchewan,” WBM President JoeAnne Hardy said. “We are so privileged to be working every day with such an amazing business community around us. These are incredible opportunities, and they are important, meaningful relationships. To be recognized by government for our work together, and for the results we are focused on delivering with a long-term contract is an incredible lift to our organization.”
The deal is the latest success for the Priority Saskatchewan action plan, a strategy unveiled in March 2015 to level the playing field for Saskatchewan businesses when bidding on government contracts. The Best Value in Procurement Act, was passed last fall and enables government to consider aspects like quality, timeliness, safety, and vendors’ past performance in addition to price when awarding contracts.
“Saskatchewan companies have themselves to thank,” SaskBuilds Minister Gordon Wyant said. “Our Priority Saskatchewan action plan is the result of their feedback and we’re seeing it work. We met with Saskatchewan companies to learn how government could help, and the result is an agreement that’s good for taxpayers and good for Saskatchewan.”
In addition to introducing best value-based procurement, considerable progress has been made on implementing other items in the Priority Saskatchewan action plan including:
- Encouraging key Crowns to take advantage of exemptions from provisions in the national Agreement on Internal Trade. This change, effective September 2015, allows these Crowns to focus on suppliers in western Canada;
- Creating a new code of conduct for procurement to clearly state the roles and responsibilities of all parties;
- Creating robust conflict of interest guidelines to ensure Saskatchewan’s standards are among the best in Canada;
- Saving businesses time and money by using multi-stage procurement more often to shortlist qualified vendors earlier in the process; and
- Helping businesses prepare for future bid opportunities by sharing the government’s long-term capital forecast (through the three-year Saskatchewan Builds Capital Plan).
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For more information, contact:
Sarah Harrison
SaskBuilds
Regina
Phone: 306-798-1213
Email: sarah.harrison@gov.sk.ca
JoeAnne Hardy
WBM Office Systems
Saskatoon
Phone: 306-664-2686