Original Tender Description
The Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) is the statutory adviser to the UK Government and devolved administrations on UK and international nature conservation. Our role is to provide scientific evidence, information, and advice to inform decisions to protect the natural environment. Our specific role is to work on nature conservation issues that affect the UK as a whole and internationally, by: • advising Government on the development and implementation of policies for, or affecting, nature conservation in the UK and internationally; • providing advice and disseminating knowledge on nature conservation issues affecting the UK and internationally; • establishing common standards throughout the UK for nature conservation, including monitoring, research, and the analysis of results; and • commissioning or supporting research which it deems relevant to these functions. Background to JNCC can be found on JNCC's website at: https://jncc.gov.uk/about-jncc/ 2. Project Aims To host the UK Marine Noise Registry (MNR) software and data in own servers and provide day to day bug investigation and fixing as well as supporting investigation of user issues for the financial year 2026/2027. 3. Project Background The UK Marine Noise Registry (MNR), established in 2015, is a custom-built database which collects data on activities in UK waters that result in impulsive noise such as seismic and sub-bottom profiler surveys, impact pile driving, and explosives. Data for planned activities is submitted at the time of licence applications and once the activity has taken place, close out data is submitted within three months of completion. The data collected refer to the type of activity, the date it occurred and where, with parameters such as sound levels and frequencies being optional contributions. The close-out data has been used to publish various outputs, including annual outputs showing the spatial and temporal distribution of noise events generated by the different activities in each year; and a report on impulsive noise in the Southern North Sea SAC between 2015-2020. More recently, its data were used to draft the impulsive noise indicator assessment for the UK Marine Strategy Assessment. In 2023, the MNR underwent a complete redesign and migrated to a new platform, R shiny. This was informed by extensive user feedback and testing and resulted in improvements to user experience and design, and two new functions were added to help with noise risk assessments and future planning. The new version is an open database with users being able to download the raw data as well as custom outputs. The MNR is currently undergoing a 4th phase of development. The new MNR has been hosted in the developer's servers, who also provide maintenance and support to ensure the smooth operation of the MNR. The new contract will cover the continued hosting and maintenance/support up to 31st March 2027. 4. Project Objectives To meet the overall aims of this project (Section 2), the objectives are: 1. Hosting of the MNR software 2. Bug investigation and fixing 3. Support to investigation of user problems 5. Project Objectives: Detailed Tasks 1. Hosting of the MNR software The contractor will host the MNR web application on their own servers for the duration of the service agreement. For the purposes of this agreement, this shall include: • A LIVE instance of the current approved release of software on their main server protected by an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) with 30 minutes back up storage; • A STAGING instance of either LIVE or an updated release of software on their main server; • A BACKUP instance of the current approved release of software on a backup server in a different physical location (without shared resources such as power or internet connection); • A database backup process such that the MNR database is saved to a remote location on a nightly basis. JNCC will be notified of any changes to the locations of these instances of the MNR software. Service Availability The LIVE and STAGING service instances shall normally be available 24 hours per day 365 days per year. Technical support shall be available from 9.00am to 5.00pm, Monday to Friday (e.g. normal business hours). Service outages outside of these times will not be investigated until the next working day. Target availability of the service shall be 98% during business hours. In the event of a prolonged service outage of the LIVE server (e.g. sustained power loss, internet connection or major hardware failure), the contractor will: • Notify JNCC of the nature of the service outage and the underlying cause (Target time shall be immediate); • Agree with JNCC the most appropriate fallback mechanism (Target time shall be 1 working day) • When agreed with JNCC, contractor to recover the database backup and connect the BACKUP server to the JNCC portal and this server will become the LIVE server. (Target time shall be 1 working day) If loss of service is as a result of hardware or software failure within the server infrastructure, the contractor will replace the failed item or rectify the fault at no cost to JNCC. Note: In the worst case failure mode, up to 1 day of data entry may be lost from the system. In this case, JNCC may be required to request users validate or re-enter lost data for the period between the last database backup and the time of failure. Planned Maintenance When planned maintenance is required to hardware or software, the contractor should notify JNCC with 5 working days notice of the need to pause the service. Planned maintenance will not occur if JNCC notify the contractor that planned maintenance activity will have a detrimental impact on users within 2 working days of the planned event. Both parties shall identify the most suitable revised date for the planned maintenance to be conducted. Migration of MNR web application and data In the eventuality that a new supplier is appointed, the MNR web application and data will need to be migrated to the new contractor's servers. A migration plan will be needed and any risks should be identified. 2. Bug investigation and fixing Where bugs have been identified by JNCC as being faults within the MNR application, the contractor should investigate the fault and identify a suitable solution (target time 2 working days). The fault will be categorised in one of the following categories. URGENT: Target time for a suitable workaround or solution will be 5 working days MAJOR: Target time for a suitable workaround or solution will be 20 working days MINOR: Target time for a suitable workaround or solution will be included in the next software release. 3. Support to investigation of user problems Where users report problems which are not fully documented or investigated, the contractor should provide, where possible, support to JNCC for investigation but this will be on a case by case basis without target timed response. 4. Potential Follow-On Work Bidders should be aware that there is the potential for the successful bidder to be requested by JNCC to undertake additional work on this contract into the financial year 2027/28. Please note however that the potential for additional work to be undertaken is subject to a continuing need, availability of funds and satisfactory contractor performance. For the avoidance of doubt, no guarantee can be given that you will be asked to undertake the potential additional work outlined within this Annex A document. Bidders are not asked to provide detailed project plans for these follow-on aspects at this stage. 5. Outputs Any products or outputs submitted to JNCC [for publication] should adhere to JNCC's house-style and should be produced in an accessible format (see product specification for more information). 6. Product Specification JNCC is committed to making its publicly available resources and documents accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018. Making material accessible means making sure it can be used by as many people as possible. This includes those with: • impaired vision • motor difficulties • cognitive impairments or learning disabilities • deafness or impaired hearing The outputs and material that JNCC publishes should be compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard. To meet this standard, all reports and other documentation which are to be made publicly available must adhere to JNCC's house-style and be produced using a JNCC template, unless otherwise stated. All reports (draft and final) should be provided electronically via email both as a Microsoft Word document and an Adobe PDF. Copies of documentation associated with case studies should be provided in electronic format with an associated reference catalogue. For any other outputs or products which are to be made publicly available through JNCC, evidence regarding how the accessibility standard will be reached should be included.