University IT deal worth £2m up for grabs

New Virtual Learning Environment needed at University of Wolverhampton

A virtualisation deal worth almost £2m is up for grabs at the University of Wolverhampton.

The Midlands institution is on the hunt for an IT partner to pioneer a new Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) after concluding that its current offering is not up to scratch.

The VLE is the university's hub of learning and teaching materials, resources and tools. Back in 2013, it undertook a "periodic review" of the VLE and realised it needed updating. In March this year, the university's management signed off on a project to improve the VLE as part of an ICT transformation programme known as Digital Campus.

The university recently published a tender asking for a new partner to come on board and overhaul the VLE.

The contract will last for five years and will be worth between £1.9m and £1.96m over that period.

The supplier must get the new VLE up and running by spring 2016 so that staff can be trained on it, before a wider rollout for a small group of early adopters in the summer. The partner would have to ensure the VLE is ready to go live in September next year.

In the tender document, the university said the new VLE must enhance learning and teaching; provide tools to encourage interactive learning; and integrate with other systems.

"The preference is to provide a VLE platform [as] either [a] managed hosting or software-as-a-service solution" the tender said. "It should be a service that is adaptable, safe, secure and can evolve within an agile ICT environment that will be transforming over the next five years through a structured programme of work."