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Report Questions Massachusetts IT Contracting

Paper claims one vendor dominates state technology purchasing.

A report this week in The Boston Globe questions the dominance of Deloitte Consulting in Massachusetts state IT contracting.

Deloitte has won a large proportion of consulting and technology contracts in the state — worth at least $330 million over the past 10 years, according to The Globe. The company is currently working on at least 12 contracts in state government, worth $215 million, that cover projects in labor, child support enforcement, human services and disaster recovery, the paper said.

While no one says that rules have been broken, critics claim that Deloitte is involved in much of the up-front planning of IT systems, and had an advantage in bidding for resulting projects.

Gary Lambert, the state’s purchasing chief, told the paper that the company’s proposals have always been assessed based on their own specific merits. A Deloitte spokesman said the company wins projects because it comes “highly recommended by IT managers inside and outside the Commonwealth based on our years of high quality public sector work.”

Massachusetts will soon seek $800 million in funding for new technology. A spokesman for Gov. Deval Patrick said the administration is working on improving procurement. “We will be rebidding services under a new model," Patrick's spokeswoman Jesse Mermel told The Globe, "which will create more competition and disqualify underperforming vendors.’’

Wayne E. Hanson served as a writer and editor with e.Republic from 1989 to 2013, having worked for several business units including Government Technology magazine, the Center for Digital Government, Governing, and Digital Communities. Hanson was a juror from 1999 to 2004 with the Stockholm Challenge and Global Junior Challenge competitions in information technology and education.