GDS Migrates DSS To Digital Marketplace

The Government Digital Service (GDS) has revealed it has successfully migrated the Digital Services Store (DSS) onto the Digital Marketplace.

The move has taken place as expected during the first quarter of 2015 and users can now buy services from the Digital Services Framework in the same place as G-Cloud services.

According to a post on the Marketplace blog, G-Cloud has been synonymous with the Marketplace for some time, but the ambition has always been to make things clearer, simple and faster for buyers by adding multiple frameworks.

The Digital Services Framework is intended to give the public sector access to suppliers of all sizes with the ability to help it conform to the digital by default standard.

It was originally housed within the DSS but the entire catalogue of digital specialists and capabilities now resides on the Marketplace.

“Now buyers who are looking for cloud services or specialists to deliver digital projects have one place to find what they need: the Digital Marketplace,” the blog post explains.

“In its first iteration, users will be directed into one of the two distinct stores, depending on their needs.

“The managed service is still mandatory for central government buyers using the DSS and the store remains open to public sector buyers only.

“As we progress and learn more about our users’ responses to these changes, we expect the overall experience  to become more integrated and driven by need, rather than the framework,” it adds.

User Feedback To Inform Future Iterations

GDS admits there are still “plenty of lessons” for it to learn but this will put it in a good position to bring on the redesigned Digital Services Framework towards the end of the year.

The organisation also hopes any lessons learnt will better equip it for the addition of other digital and IT frameworks currently being discussed as contenders for the Digital Marketplace.

“All of this supports our Digital Marketplace strategy to bring about lasting change to the way that government and the wider public sector think about and commission digital,” the blog post claimed.

© 24N.biz