Rostelecom saved 3 billion rubles on purchase of Set-top boxes

Rostelecom summed up the results of mega-purchase of set-top boxes (STB) for rendering service of IPTV "Interactive Television"^[1]. In total the company needed over 3.3 million devices for which it was ready to spend about $131.3 million. According to the results of selection of suppliers the operator managed to save about $50 million (about 3 billion rubles at the rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation for December 31, 2016).

Rostelecom saved 3 billion rubles on purchase of Set-top boxes

Applications for participation in purchase were submitted by 20 companies: "Research and production Company of ROTEK", "Ufa plant "Promsvyaz", Ektiv Telecom, Indzhinyes Group, Twip, Imaqliq, Inlayn Tekhnolodzhis, Kyyutek, My TV, "Research and Production Company Svitron", Serkomm Russia, Television systems, Superveyv Group, Telekor, Trilaynsistems, Ztisvyaztekhnologiya's Corporation, Marvel KT, Planar-Trade, Smartlabs and "Technology Systems and Service".

The stage of assessment was reached by 14 requests, and winners announced only three. The Inlayn Tekhnolodzhis company got the first place, with it the delivery contract of 1.68 million prefixes for $40.6 million (about 2.464 billion rubles) will be signed. The second place was given to the request "NPK ROTEK". With this company it is going to sign the delivery agreement of 1 million devices for $24.4 million (about 1.478 billion rubles). The third place was taken by "Technology Systems and Service" company, with it the delivery contract of 672.3 thousand prefixes for $16.3 million (about 989 million rubles) should be signed. Thus, total decrease in the starting price of the agreement was about $50 million.

In recent years other suppliers became winners of similar purchases of Rostelecom. So, "The Ufa plant "Promsvyaz" entering into Bashinformsvyaz Group in October, 2014 won the tender for delivery of 260 thousand prefixes for 444 million rubles.

In 2015 Rostelecom held 2 large tenders, at the same time all procurements were conducted in US dollars. In February, 2015 the first tender in foreign currency for delivery of 1.3 thousand Set-top boxes (STB) was announced. Total amount of purchase was $63.7 million. Companies "Smartlabs", "Inlayn Telecom Solyushns" and "The Ufa plant "Promsvyaz" which had to transfer to the operator 650 thousand, 390 thousand and 260 thousand prefixes respectively became winners then.

At the end of 2015 one more purchase took place. In it delivery more than 1.5 million STB for $61.7 million "was played". Winners announced "The Ufa plant "Promsvyaz", Superveyv Group and Smartlabs which in different proportions had to provide prefixes to the customer.

The current request for proposals on delivery of STB was announced in the first half of October, 2016. On November 30 the company published the updated procurement documentation.

According to technical requirements the Set-top box should be based on the generation Broadcom BCM7230 or ARM chip not below Cortex A5 with clock rate not less 800Mhz and GPU of generation is not lower than Mali-400MP2. The platform should provide performance not less than 1500 DMIPS, have RAM of DDR3 not less than 512 MB and Flash-memory not less than 256 MB. Performance of the network interface - not less than 50 Mbit / c.

STB should be capable to decode and display hardware the following formats of audio and video:

• Not less than one video of a flow of Full HD resolution (to 1080p30);
• Not less than one video of a flow of SD of permission (576p/576i/480p/480i);
• Support of the video modes (not worse): 720x576i @50Hz; 720x576p @50Hz; 1280x720p @50Hz; 1920x1080i @50Hz; 1920x1080p @25Hz. 4.3.2.3.4
• Video codecs: MPEG-1 (ISO/IEC 11172-1), MPEG-2 (ISO/IEC 13818-1), MPEG-4.10 (H.264, ISO 14496-10) with the maximum bitrate of 20 Mbps in all video modes;
• Audio codecs: AAC (ISO 14496-3) with bitrate is not lower than 320 Kbps; PCM (sampling rate: 32, 44.1, 48 KHZ; sampling resolution: up to 16 bits); Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus; with bitrate it is not lower than 380 Kbps; • MPEG –1 is not lower than 320 Kbps of Layer 1, 2, 3 (MP3) (ISO/IEC 11172-3, ISO/IEC 13818-3) with bitrate;

In addition, the prefix should support the multicast display of content in the containers MPEG-2TS and have potential of hardware decoding of images in the PNG, JPEG (HD) formats.

Delivery date of the equipment - no more than 90 working days from signature date by the parties of the corresponding order. At the same time the supplied equipment should be made no more than in 6 months (183 calendar days) prior to date of the conclusion of the corresponding order to the agreement.

The maximum price of one device should not have exceeded $39. Based on purchase it was reduced to $24.

Notes