Department of Veterans Affairs, Acquisition Operations Service (93C), 810 Vermont Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20420-0000

D -- TELECOMMUNICATIONS SERVICES DUE 071897 POC Laura Zotian (202)273-8091 Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) requests information/comments from industry about replacint the existing VA Wide Area Network. VA anticipates a procurement for replacement of its Integrated Data Communications Utility (IDCU) Wide-Area Network by July, 1998. The IDCU is a "utility"type service to VA agencies. it provide connectivity, capacity, and network supportfor the entire department. The IDCU currently consists primarily of X.25 and Frame Relay service support, with the majority of new services and traffic increases being satisfied by Frame Relay. The IDCU network carries approximately 225 GB per month of X.25 traffic and 1,400 GB per month of Frame Relay traffic. Total traffic is estimated to grow to 6,000 GB per month by the year 2000, and could expand to 15,000 GB by the year 2010. Current plans call for a competitive solicitation for a full service, single source, network servicemanager. It is anticipated that the network service manager will employ one or more transpot suppliers as well as commercially available network management services. VA is interested in commerical market response to its requirements. Serious potential, bidders are invited to submit a reply, within 10 business days after this initial posting, as outlined in the detail that can be found on the VA Home Page. This is not a solicitation; it is for planning pruposes only. VA does not intend to award any contract on the basis of teh RFI or otherwise pay for information submitted. VA is not obligated to respond to comments. VA is not obligated to provide any information beyond what is provided in this RFI. Additional information about this planned solicitation and information being requested can be found on the VA Home Page at htt;//www.va.gov/oa&mm/busopp/vanrfi.htm. (0182)

Loren Data Corp. http://www.ld.com (SYN# 0023 19970703\D-0001.SOL)