DTA hands contracts to BCG, Deloitte, McKinsey and KPMG
Australia’s Digital Transformation Agency has in the past month handed out tenders worth nearly $2.5 million to large consultancy firms.
US-origin Boston Consulting Group has been selected to support two projects. The first is focused on providing advisory and digital expertise to the Digital Transformation Agency (DTA), aimed at improving the agency’s services. The six-week engagement has a contract value of $396,000.
The second deal has a value of $3273,000, and focuses on “whole-of-Australian-government ICT policy and governance” support, said a listing on the Digital Marketplace. “The project will identify policy opportunities to optimise funding arrangements for digital and ICT investments – to better support development and sustainment of shared capabilities, and more flexible approaches to resourcing for agile delivery.”
In addition, Boston Consulting Group has been tasked with “designing models and processes for digital and ICT decision-making to ensure robust governance of performance, risk, strategic alignment, architecture, investment planning and stakeholder engagement.”
The strategy consulting firm is enjoying a close relationship with the DTA in recent months. The firm is one of the lead consultants for its COVIDSafe app, having bagged over $1 millionsince being engaged in the early-stages of the project.
Another trusted supplier to the DTA is Deloitte. Its Deloitte Consulting and Deloitte Digital wings are integrally involved with the development of the new social network-inspired myGov platform. Having supported the design phase, in May the DTA confirmed the Big Four giant has been retained to build a beta model of the government’s new digital experience platform. Deloitte will ultimately be paid to the tune of $20 million for its efforts.
Now, in a new $400,000 contract listed on the Digital Marketplace, Deloitte has been hired to work on the development of a portal – although it is unclear if this spending relates to the myGov platform or a new portal.
The Digital Transformation Agency also brought in KPMG to develop an “OECD business case playbook” (cost: $100,000) and strategy consultancy McKinsey & Company to oversee the development of a new visa processing platform on a near $1 million contract.
Related: Consulting firms working on Australia's visa outsourcing program.
McKinsey previously worked on the design and setup of the new Services Australia department (the parent organisation of the DTA), and was tapped to develop a business case for GovDXP. The strategy giant received $1 million for its three-month work on the document.
In its latest reporting year, the Digital Transformation Agency spent more than $30 million external consulting firms, up from just over $6 million in the 2018-19 financial year.
According to a number of government officials, the DTA, which employs around 250 full time employees, is becoming increasingly over reliant on external consultants. As former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who established the then Digital Transformation Office in 2015 as Communications Minister, put it: “You should only be using consultants to do things that are a little bit exotic, where you need a specialist expertise.”
