GHSC-RTK Quarterly Report for April – June 2016

The project aims to improve the supply chain for health commodities, particularly RTKs, to support the fight against HIV/AIDS. RMI continues to build and improve its service delivery, offering good value for services provided. Staffing changes were made during the quarter to improve capability. The IDIQ and TO Director positions were combined, and the Sr. Procurement Logistics Manager (PLM) was replaced with someone who has RTK experience. An additional PLM position was created to account for the increased commodity procurement orders. The Financial Manager was also replaced with someone who has significant USAID and financial reporting experience. These changes have created a tighter and more robust team, enabling RMI to keep up with the increased workload. The project has made significant progress in updating IDIQs with commodity suppliers. The IDIQ with Chembio was finalized and awarded, while the IDIQ with Premier is finalized except for one clause related to a fee schedule for storage in cases where waiver times exceed 30 days. Alere's IDIQ is almost complete, and the SD Bioline and Determine IDIQs have been put on one IDIQ. Trinity has promised to complete and sign its IDIQ by the end of July, pending additional Alere reviews. RMI has also updated Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to reflect the change from SCMS to PSM partners. Transition meetings with PSM have been held to review processes and develop communications plans. Both projects have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) and a roles and responsibilities matrix. RMI will interface its NetSuite system with PSM's ARTEMIS system to automatically transfer orders from PSM to RTK. Despite progress, challenges remain. Pre-shipment QA sampling officially began for orders placed after April 1, and RMI is working to develop a more automated, timely, and standardized method of communication between the QA team and the GHSC-QA team. Trinity Biotech experienced manufacturing problems, resulting in delayed shipments, and RMI is post-shipment sampling Trinity orders until a pre-shipment sampling process is authorized. The SKB kits were removed from the WHO pre-qualification list, and RMI has been working with countries to place orders for alternative products. RMI has revised its country budget monitoring process by adding a field to NetSuite to categorize orders as COP or Core funding. An audit of orders received from SCMS revealed that all but one of their PRs listed COP funding. RMI will need to work with SCMS and USAID to reconcile the funding category on orders for Mozambique, Tanzania, and DRC. The project has delivered over $12 million in commodities and logistics to 16 countries during the quarter. Logenix continues to be the best value supplier, accounting for 87% of business. The project has also made progress in meeting KPI targets, with an average shelf life of 82% at delivery. However, short shelf-life orders remain a challenge, and RMI is working to improve logistics and reduce shelf life losses.