Coming soon: Emerging Technologies RFQ

We are thrilled to announce that later this spring, the Office of the City Administrator and Department of Technology will release a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) solicitation as we seek to create a pool of firms who provide products, software, and services powered by emerging technologies such as AI. This pool is a two-year pilot of a new procurement framework to enable smarter City acquisition and testing of technology.

Emerging Technologies

Background

As a City, we are constantly striving to improve the way we do business to deliver services to San Franciscans, including through innovative technology. As the home of AI, we are excited about the promise of AI to help us do our work for the public more effectively – and we also recognize the need to vet new tools to ensure they solve challenges while minimizing risks, including bias, inaccurate or misleading outputs, privacy and security concerns, and erosion of public trust.

Towards those goals, we are creating this Emerging Technologies RFQ pool to enable our departments to experiment with emerging technologies safely so we can ensure we're getting the right tools at the right price to meet our and the public’s needs.

Join the pool

We anticipate issuing the RFQ solicitation this spring, and interested firms can apply to join the pool at any time. Please note that firms must meet certain Minimum Qualifications to join the pool, which will be published in the solicitation. Once released, the solicitation will be found on the SF City Partner Portal.

Once you’re in the pool

Once your firm is in the pool, City departments will request proposals for specific projects. Initially, the City will seek a lower-dollar, shorter-term engagement and contract while we safely test the product or service against our needs. If the experiment is successful, we will then seek a longer-term contract as we implement the new technology in our operations.

Interested?

If your business is interested in working with a government leading in innovation and smart, ethical adoption of emerging technologies, please consider applying to join the RFQ pool once the solicitation is released later this spring. Until then, you can indicate your interest here, and we’ll notify you when the RFQ is posted.