AV Integrators

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Conner Krey, Baylor University

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Oct 14, 2014, 4:22:21 PM10/14/14
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Greetings,

One of the local AV integrators we work with has expressed interest in entering a contract with us. The basics of the agreement would be that we benefit by receiving lower prices as they would lower their markup on hardware and we'd have an agreement on the labor rate, and they would benefit in being the sole provider of our AV integration work.
  1. Do any of your schools have a similar agreement? If so, how has it worked?
  2. If you do not have this sort of agreement, do you solicit competitive bids any time you hire an AV integrator?
Thanks for your time.

-Conner Krey

Thomas, Harry (CIV)

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Oct 14, 2014, 5:24:18 PM10/14/14
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Conner,

We’re run by DOD and subject to Federal Acquisition Regulations. Almost all our integrated systems go through a competitive bidding process. Exceptions can occur, but must be justified with solid rationale and approved by the contracting officer. 

It is possible for Govt agencies to negotiate contracts like what you describe, but it’s above my pay grade and that contract itself would have to be competitively bid. I would have to write the requirements, then contracting would add the legal stuff. The result being that we would not know whether we’re getting a good contractor until we’d lived with them for a while, unless we got lucky and the winner was one we knew of and had given good service in the past. The bad ones are the stuff of nightmares. My sweet dreams all involve a universe where I am the final say about who gets the job. Then I wake up. ;-)

Regards,
Harry
------------------------------------
Harry Thomas
AV/VTC Engineer
Educational Technologies
Naval Postgraduate School
Monterey, California

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jrcla...@gmail.com

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Oct 15, 2014, 12:01:43 PM10/15/14
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I have tried to convince the suits at Penn to look into this as a viable alternative to constantly depleting resources for bidding processes that yield little to no cost savings to the University.  I'm not sure how Baylor is run, but I can tell you that it would never really work well at Penn because of the decentralized nature of it's business model.  Wharton has done it with positive results, though they are a different breed of school on campus.  Temple University has done this in the past, and likely still does.  Those are the only ones I can think of that use the process effectively.

Harry, my wife was a contracting officer for the Navy for a few years, and now runs contracting policy for DHS.  I know all too well the process (pain) you have to endure.  At least we here at Penn get to pick our vendors, though it hasn't always equated to mutual value for both parties.

Whitfield, Ben

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Oct 15, 2014, 1:30:38 PM10/15/14
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We make use of ours here within the UNC System of 17 statewide universities. It was negotiated by North Carolina State University but the condition apply to any one of the 17 schools who would like to make use of it. In this case, it is not just one vendor but a group of 20 who all agreed to the conditions. It is called the “NCSU Convenience contract” and it certainly lives up to its advertising. One of the biggest hurdles it clears is it allows us to bypass the bid process to go with a trusted and known vendor we know can do the job at hand. Plus it is a leverage that we can use in the future should we not be pleased with work performed. As it was written, it had an option to update and continue use after a certain number of years and this was done recently since it has been so useful to us and other schools within the system. The only fault is that it is not widely known by all our sister schools and I have found myself at meets with them, explaining its availability.

It certainly saves us money, but the big advantage to us is not having to deal with the bid process which is required by the state for all projects 5k and up, and as you well know, hitting the 5K mark is real easy and fast in the AV world. That and the time that the bid process takes, for we often find ourselves with a very short window to get a project done as students will be filling the seats in the room shortly. So when a department knows its funds available and wanting something done we need the flexibility to hit the ground running. That is what this contract offers us, that and we know we are not getting a vendor who bit off more than they can chew. Those who award the bids sometimes do not fully understand the nature of the AV world, such as when you award a project to an outfit that is based a 1000 miles away, who contracts an installer who is 300 miles away, and when the room is down, and they are to service it, they cannot get to it for two weeks. That does not fly when you have to have a class in there the next day, or the Dean’s conference room has a very important meeting in there the next day. Going with what you know often is the best way to go.

As to the second question, that contract peaks at 300K. Any project costing more has to and should be sent out for competitive bid, we just write into the bid package that we reserve the right not to select the lowest bidder. Case in point: Seven figure AV project for new 7 story building. Lowest bidder was a Mom and Pop operation, that was more Office furniture story that AV integrator. Just because you can hang a projector and a white board does not make you an AV expert. If we had been forced to go with them, in the long run we would have spent way more correcting course then having done right the first time. I know enough vendors nationally and locally and know who is capable of doing such a project on time, under budget, and more importantly has the staff to do it and service it while under warranty contract. So there is and always be a need for a Bid process, but a contract agreement is a very valuable tool to have in the kit.

Aside for the above Convenience Contract, we have other negotiated contracts similar to what you mention in your first question that is specific to our University only. These are renewed every three years, and the discount percentages for both gear and labor are on par with the contract I mentioned above. In this, the university put out to area vendors the opportunity to bid on Labor, Programming hour rates, and Gear discount (normally along the lines of an extra 10% off the educational discount offered by manufactures). The Vendors can bid on all or just the sections they want. Since all three are used in most projects, it behooves them to bid on all three. The university then selects those who come in with the lowest rates. What do they get in return? All gear purchases has to have labor associated with it, and increased volume of business as this contract is pointed out to all departments as the what to use.

 

I am not sure if you want to be locked into a “sole provider” clause. I have had discussions with peers over the past years about AV integration companies taking us for granted sometimes because we do so much business with them. When it comes to client/supplier relationships, it is essential that the provider of services Listen to the client and their wants and needs, even if the client has no idea what they are talking about. It is here where the true professionals separate themselves sin their ability to translate a client’s request, steer them in the right direction and deliver. If the company is that dang good, then they do not need to lock you into a sole provider clause, their quality work should keep you coming back.  Other than that, having such a deal is a good thing.

 

Good luck!

 

 

 

Ben Whitfield

Office of Information Systems

UNC School of Medicine

439 MacNider Hall

Chapel Hill, NC 27599

Ruben_W...@med.unc.edu

919.966.6841

Stultum est timere quod vitare non potes.

Publius Syrus

 

From: av...@googlegroups.com [mailto:av...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Conner Krey, Baylor University
Sent: Tuesday, October 14, 2014 4:22 PM
To: av...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [av-1] AV Integrators

 

Greetings,

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