Times Of Swaziland: EEC TO SPEND OVER E10M ON VOICE RADIO REPLACEMENT

EEC TO SPEND OVER E10M ON VOICE RADIO REPLACEMENT
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Nhlanganiso Mkhonta on 07/04/2024 16:28:00


MBABANE – The Eswatini Electricity Company (EEC) has engaged a South African
company for the replacement of voice radio throughout all its sites where
required.
This comes after EEC had extended its operation base by extending its
distribution network and adding depots, substations and transmission network
coverage over the years. Therefore, there was a need to optimise the available
spectrum resources to improve operational efficiency when restoring the network
and services to customers. The Digital Mobile Radio (DMR) standard is
recommended to be employed by the company and the spectrum resource will be
shared by workstations. Last year the company invited suitable local and
international competent service providers to extend proposals to perform the
required services.
Following a competitive bidding process, conducted in terms of section 45 of the
Public Procurement Act No.7 of 2011 (the Act), Altron Nexus, the South African
company emerged the best evaluated tenderer. Altron Nexus scored 87.4 per cent
and the proposed contract price is E10 314 877.21.  According to the intention
to award tender notice published in the Eswatini Public Procurement Regulatory
Agency (ESPPRA), other companies that had submitted proposals included one other
South African and two local companies. The other South African company called
EMCOM was ranked second best after scoring 72.9 per cent while the local
companies (Advanced Technologies and M26 Technologies) did not qualify for
technical evaluation.
This tender will include supply, installation and commissioning of a complete
voice radio system throughout all the required sites. The aim of the project is
to replace the following:
* 19 x Repeaters
* 80 x Base Radios
* 300 x Mobile Radios
* 60 x Portable Radios
* Unified Communication System
* 3 x Consoles at Site A
* 3 x Consoles at Site B.
It is worth noting that a legacy communication server is installed in one site.
This server connects two-wire extension telephone lines and analogue radio
signals. EEC has upgraded its telephone exchange system (PABX) to IP and the
system cannot connect to the unified communication system. The current radio
system and the unified communication system server do not integrate well, and
this causes communication challenges which frustrate users of the system. There
are three sites (Site A, B and C) which are geo separated and connect to the
main system through IP and E1 links provided by the internal EEC network.
Furthermore, there are radios that are installed remotely and are cross
connected to the main system via 4-wire E&M circuit. The remote setup enables
radio communication to the depots that cannot be reached by one repeater. During
the request for proposals, it was stated that potential suppliers must propose a
system that will meet the above mentioned requirements to replace the current
system.