Queensland Rail (QR) is seeking Expressions of Interest (EOIs) from providers to inform the planning and potential future procurement of data centre infrastructure and services.
QR’s current Operating Technology (OT) Data Centres (DCs) host and support several business critical and operational services.
The two DCs and Witness site are located within Brisbane, accommodating the Operational DC infrastructure and the Control Systems DC infrastructure.
Due to the DC switching infrastructure nearing end of support, there is a need for QR to refresh, modernise and improve the OT, on-premises, DC environments.
QR is undertaking a digital infrastructure uplift to support future-facing service delivery, meet increased demand for data processing and storage, and align with carbon reduction and resilience targets.
The scope of the opportunity includes designing and providing new DC switching-network infrastructure for the Operational Network, Control Systems Network and Witness DCs.
The new DC networks need to provide seamless, efficient data centre interconnectivity with the option to scale to three or four Data Centres.
They also need a Logical Layer 2 connectivity between all DCs, regardless of location; high availability and full redundancy of infrastructure; and vendor-agnostic architecture with backward compatibility for some legacy systems (e.g. 10Mb copper connectivity).
Providers will also be required to provide a DC management system that enhances security, reduces the complexity of manual provisioning, monitoring and assisting in troubleshooting DC environments; a DC Lab with operational Network 6 racks; and secure, physically separate Out-of-Band network.
The strategic objectives QR is trying to achieve are to future-proof QR’s critical infrastructure and digital assets; support scalability, agility, and integration with cloud platforms; improve cybersecurity posture across OT environments; facilitate external partner integrations in a secure and controlled manner; and enable real-time data processing and operational continuity.
This EOI is not a tender for works; however, QR intends to prepare a shortlist from respondents to this EOI and invite those respondents to submit written tenders.
The validity period of EOI submissions will be 180 calendar days from the EOI closing date, which is 2PM on Tuesday 26 August 2025.
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