Five IT companies have taken part in a re-tender issued by the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE), to install a campus wide network infrastructure at the inactive Ethiopian Academy of Financial Studies (EAFS) compound located in the Akaki area, 20Km east of Addis Abeba.

NBE cancelled a first tender, because only two companies had handed in their tender documents by the set deadline of August 13, 2006, forcing the Bank to re-tender on August 27 with the submission deadline set for September 25.
 

In accordance to deadline, four local IT companies, including Global Computing Solutions (GCS), TCT and the two IT companies that had taken part in the first tender - Micro Sun Solutions (MSS) and United Systems Integrators (USI) - submitted their tender documents. A company based in the United Kingdom, APRIROSE, has also handed in its documents for participation.
 

Although all documents were to be in by 4pm on the due date, MSS and GCS did not attach their bid bonds to their documents until 4:15pm.
 

Although the tender documents were expected to be opened on the date of submission, they actually remained sealed. According to an official from NBE, they will be opened by Friday October 6, 2006.
 

The winning company, which will be contracted to make the installations, will also be required to supply and install a Development and Deployment of Management Information System as well as the School Administration System.

The reason for the cancellation of the tender, which was issued in June 2006 was that although 13 companies bought tender documents, only two companies, Micro Sun Solutions (MSS) and United Systems Integrators (USI), were able to hand in their tender documents within the 45-day limit provided. The Bank has allocated 15 million Br for the project.
 

The Akaki Academy lies on a 165,000sqm plot and was built for more than 67.3 million Br by AKIR Construction Plc and consulting company, Universal Consultants Consulting Architects and Engineers.

The institution, which has the capacity to enroll 500 students, has still not started operation, although construction was concluded in June 2005.

Due to this fact, five months ago the Office of the Prime Minister allocated some of the offices and classes to distance learning courses conducted by the University of South Africa.