DOTC: New income-generating IT system up and running Aug 2013

The Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) said Tuesday that the P8.2 billion Land Transportation Office (LTO) information technology system will be in place August next year.   In a statement, the agency said the new system would not yet be in place by February 2013 as the DOTC would still have to assess the technical bids submitted by the five pre-qualified bidders.   "We estimate several more months or sometime in August next year before the new IT system provider can fully implement the LTO Road IT Infrastructure Project,” DOTC said.   The agency also clarified that the LTO-Road Transportation IT infrastructure project has not yet been awarded to any of the bidders that participated in the opening of the bid documents.   “The granting of the notice of award comes much later after the opening of bids in all biddings of the government. This is just among the rigid and several steps required by law, before the award of government projects, to ensure that public funds are properly allocated,” the DOTC explained. Transportation secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya said the new IT system would provide a viable and long-term solution to the current system’s issues.   “The previous LTO IT system, which has been running for 13 years, is no longer responsive to current land transportation regulation requirements,” Abaya stressed.   Once the new LTO-IT system is in place, it will be easier for authorities to recover stolen vehicles, trace smuggled vehicles, prevent double registration and monitor unregistered vehicles   “Once the new IT set up is complete, which the government will own and operate, it will allow LTO to earn approximately an additional P2 billion a year since all computer fees will accrue to government. This is another example of Daang Matuwid,” the DOTC said.   It added that the next step is for the DOTC to conduct a thorough bid evaluation and post qualification process to address other remaining technical/administrative issues. This is in accordance with the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) of Republic Act (RA) 9184, otherwise known as the “Government Procurement Reform Act”. DOTC/LTO expects that once the automation systems of LTO and Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) are up and running, the government would be able to eliminate cases of PUVs securing an LTFRB franchise without LTO registration, as well as PUVs that are registered with the LTO but have no LTFRB franchise. Bidding   Five out of the nine companies that purchased bid documents participated in the open and transparent procurement process.   Digitext offered the lowest bid at P3.8 billion, followed by Fritz and Macziol Asia which offered P5.3 billion, while Eurolink was third at P5.8 billion. Other bidders were Kaisa Consulting and Ceragon Network.   Financial bids of the two participating bidders—Kaisa Consulting and Ceragon Network—were not opened because of lack of technical requirements.   Kaisa was considered as non-complying for lack of schedule of requirements, while Ceragon also lacked schedule of requirements and certificate of reciprocity for a foreign consortium to qualify for the bid.   “Government bidding is composed of two components – the technical and the financial bid.  In the case of Kaisa and Ceragon, what we opened were only their technical bids.  We were not able to proceed with the opening of the financial bids accordingly because they failed to submit the required documentary materials,” according to DOTC.   Four other companies purchased bidding documents but did not participate in the bidding including Stradcom Corporation, the current system provider of the LTO-IT; Smartmatic, Oberthur Technologies and Indra Sistemas, S.A. — DVM, GMA News