To: Board of Supervisors
From: Marc Shorr, Information Technology Director
Report Title: Execute a Contract with Nautilus
Recommendation: Recommendation of the County Administrator
RECOMMENDATIONS:
APPROVE and AUTHORIZE the Purchasing Agent on behalf of the Chief Information Officer to execute a Service Order with Nautilus Data Technologies in an amount not to exceed $72,000, subject to the September 19, 2023, Master Service Agreement with Nautilus, to provide data center services for the County’s Disaster Recovery Site for the period of September 1, 2026, through August 31, 2027, and for annual periods thereafter in the absence of termination by either the County or Nautilus.
APPROVE and AUTHORIZE future service orders with Nautilus Data Technologies issued pursuant to the terms of the Master Service Agreement, provided that each purchase order includes a payment limit of $200,000 or less, and the terms of the Master Service Agreement have not substantially changed.
FISCAL IMPACT:
The cost of this product is included in the department’s FY 26-27 budget (100% User Departments).
BACKGROUND:
The Department of Information Technology (DoIT) maintains and operates the County’s primary data center, which provides critical services to the County that must be continuously available in the event of a natural disaster including earthquakes, fire, and floods. Acknowledging the essential nature of these services, DoIT successfully established a disaster recovery data center in September 2023 to ensure uninterrupted operations in the event the primary data center in Martinez becomes unavailable.
DoIT established several requirements for the County’s Disaster Recovery Data Center. It must have geographic separation from the primary data center located in Martinez; it must guarantee a minimum of 99.99% uptime and availability; DoIT staff must be able to access the facility 24x7 to maintain County equipment; and it must be monitored and secured on a 24x7 basis.
Beginning in October 2022, DoIT conducted an analysis of several possible locations that could meet the County’s needs to serve as the County’s disaster recovery site. These included data centers operated by the State of California; three neighboring county governments that met the geographic separation requirements for disaster recovery; and referrals for commercial datacenter providers utilized by other governmental organizations. After reviewing each option including fixed and variable costs, requirements the County would have to meet, uptime guarantees, and access requirements, DoIT identified the data center owned and operated by Nautilus as the preferred option. This selection was made based on low fixed monthly cost, guaranteed 99.99% uptime, independent 24x7 access to the data center for DoIT staff, County can install its own data circuits and not be restricted to the provider’s vendors and their costs, and no extra charge for escorted access into the data center.
The Nautilus data center is built on a floating barge that is permanently docked at the Port of Stockton in San Joaquin County. This provides the Nautilus data center with unique capabilities to withstand natural disasters including earthquakes, fire, and floods, that traditional land-based data centers cannot easily provide. Nautilus provides the County with the necessary space, electrical power, cooling, and security for the equipment the County installed for disaster recovery purposes.
This data center is classified as a Tier 4 data center that has no single point of failure that will provide the County with a data center that is guaranteed to have 100% uptime and availability, exceeding the County’s requirement of 99.99% uptime. Additionally, the data center is monitored and secured by Federal Port Police on a 24x7 basis and DoIT staff has 24x7 access to the data center to maintain County equipment. The data center is currently used by other government organizations, including San Joaquin County and the United States Department of State.
With the disaster recovery data center now in place, the County is well-positioned to ensure the continuity of critical IT services and operations, even in the face of significant disruptions or emergencies.
This Master Service Agreement with Nautilus has a mutual indemnification provision which provides that each party will defend and indemnify the other for injuries or losses arising out of the performance of the agreement, along with a limitation of liability that caps Nautilus’s liability to the amount the County paid in the 12 months prior to the event that triggered the liability.
CONSEQUENCE OF NEGATIVE ACTION:
Without a disaster recovery data center, the County would be exposed to significant operational, financial, reputational, and security risks. The existing solution provides continuity, resilience, and assurance that the County can maintain vital services in the face of unexpected disruptions.