“Business Benefits Realisation” (hahaha)
Denham Sadler’s story in InnovationAus.Com about the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission’s (ACIC) biometric identification project falls into the category of “funny if not so tragic”.
(And if you’re not getting the regular newsletters from InnovationAus.Com — you should sign up immediately.)
There are many questions this article raises for the casual observer.
But. In the context of “Business Benefits Realisation”, I just wanted to note the following one point from the above news story:
Now this is interesting. Because the project is, in fact, a “facial recognition project”. You’d think that by removing facial recognition from the scope of a facial recognition project, that would mean … there is no project left.
Of course, I immediately Googled “reliable facial recognition technology” — thinking that — in 2018 — facial recognition would be a fairly mature technology — so why is this vendor not able to get it to work?
The first hit on Google was from NEC. Their website promoting their facial recognition technology is kind of spooky, actually. Worth a review. Download some of their white papers. This is your future.
NEC are the vendor for the ACIC facial recognition program. NEC’s website proudly promotes the accuracy and reliability of NEC’s … facial recognition technology.
Now. Perhaps, before the ACIC program commenced, one assumes NEC had the rudiments of a “facial recognition” technology. Possibly written by that summer intern graduate student using a Raspberry Pi? Whatever.
NEC responded to a competitive tender published by ACIC. NEC won the tender. In fact, here’s the (2 May 2016) NEC announcement on their website announcing that they won the tender, where they proudly assert:
“NEC Australia was able to offer CrimTrac a proven solution”
(CrimTrac was what ACIC was named before it was named ACIC.)
“A proven solution”. Meaning: “We already have it, we know it works, and all we have to do is to install and deploy it.”
So. How did it all go pear-shaped?
One wonders if ACIC required the vendor NEC to do even a rudimentary product demonstration (before awarding the contract to them). A “proof of concept” perhaps?
Nah. Why bother? NEC is a big company. No vendor would ever over-market or miss-sell the capabilities of their technology products, would they? Perish the thought.
So. This ACIC embarrassment is another instance — possibly — of a vendor winning a tender, then getting paid by a federal agency to develop the product on site. That’s not “buy before build” — that’s “commission before build”.
Your tax dollars at work. Shame about all those under-funded schools, hospitals, and public transport.
