TechOne was a bad choice for IFMS

by BUI WETAU

IFMS as it is will always fail. This attack or malfunction is just the tip of the iceberg.

Initially when IFMS (Integrated Financial Management System) was tendered as a project to integrate the three stand-alone financial operating systems in use; PBS (Planning & Budgeting System), PGAS (Provincial Government Accounting System) and the TMS (Treasury Management System), four international IT companies tendered their bid and all four were invited for a presentation for selected users of the three stand-alone systems from the Treasury Department to assess their presentation. TechOne was of the four. I happened to be one of the judges or user of the three systems making the assessment.

Of the four, Oracle stood out to be the best.

Although with very little IT knowledge, I was fully aware of what the Department or the Government wanted and Oracle ticked all boxes without a single doubt. PBS at that time was Oracle based so all they offered was to integrate PGAS and TMS with the existing PBS and that was to take only 2-3 years to complete at the lowest possible cost.

And see how far we have come with TechOne and only someone from the inside can tell us how much it has cost us to date. My intelligent guess would be something towards a billion kina and this figure will continue to grow as long as TechOne is still around.

To be honest, all users present for the presentation at the 2nd Floor of Vulupindi Haus voted (in private) for Oracle to develop our new state-of-the-art system (IFMS) that would revolutionize the way Government financing, budgeting, accounting and reporting systems were handled. Their presentation was sharp and to point.

It was a big surprise when the announcement was made a week later that TechOne was awarded the multi-million kina project. It also did not come as a surprise as senior officers of the Department were seen with very expensive TechOne pens and writing pads.

TechOne will always fail IFMS.