Overview
Hillsborough County is Florida's fourth-most-populous county, anchored by Tampa, with roughly 1.6 million residents and ongoing rapid growth. It is governed by a Board of County Commissioners with a professional County Administrator as chief executive, overseeing more than 5,200 employees and a wide service portfolio (public safety support, utilities/water, transportation, libraries, parks, health and human services).
Technology is centralized: the County's Information & Innovation Office / IT Services function is led by a Chief Information & Innovation Officer who sits on the executive team, and it supports enterprise infrastructure, applications, data, and cybersecurity across departments.
For a Dell SLG seller, Hillsborough is a high-value standalone account — large enough to run its own competitive procurements and cooperative buys, while also fitting inside the broader Florida public-sector and Tampa Bay regional growth story.
- Information & Innovation Office (CIO Ramin Kouzehkanani) is the technology buying center, sitting on the County Administrator's executive team
- County Administrator Bonnie Wise's office owns budget preparation and shapes what gets funded
- Board of County Commissioners approves the budget and contracts of size — the gate for major buys, under heightened DOGE-committee efficiency scrutiny
- Procurement Services runs competitive solicitations; Florida state term contracts and national co-ops (OMNIA, Sourcewell) are exempt from Chapter 10 piggyback limits — the fastest compliant path
Where Dell Can Play
- Map the relationship to the Chief Information & Innovation Officer (Ramin Kouzehkanani) and the County Administrator's office — confirm current incumbents before outreach, and tie the conversation to the County's innovation branding.
- Confirm Dell's coverage on the vehicles Hillsborough actually uses — its own Procurement Services contracts, Florida state term contracts, and national cooperatives (OMNIA, Sourcewell) — so there's a frictionless path to contract.
- Lead with ISG infrastructure (compute, storage, networking) and client/endpoint refresh for a 5,200-employee, ~1.6M-resident organization under sustained growth pressure.
- Attach a cybersecurity and resilience play to Florida's Local Government Cybersecurity Grant Program and Cyber Florida (USF, Tampa) resources as funding angles.
- Frame proposals around efficiency and measurable ROI given the 2025 state-level budget review — position consolidation and lifecycle savings, not just net-new spend.
Budget & Fiscal
Hillsborough County's all-funds budget is large — reported at roughly $9 billion when Florida's state-level efficiency task force reviewed it in 2025 — spanning operating, capital, and enterprise (utility) funds. IT and innovation spending is a department-level slice of that total; exact figures live in the County's adopted budget documents and should be confirmed against the current adopted book before forecasting.
- The County publishes recommended and adopted budget books (FY26–FY27) on hcfl.gov — use those for the authoritative IT/innovation line and capital technology projects.
- Property-tax-funded general government, enterprise utility funds, and grant funding each carry their own technology spend; the buying center varies by fund and department.
Initiatives & Priorities
The Information & Innovation Office centralizes infrastructure, applications, and data services for a 5,200-employee organization serving ~1.6M residents — an ongoing modernization track around data center, cloud, endpoint, and citizen-facing digital services. Confirm current refresh cycles and project lists in the adopted budget.
Modernization Digital ServicesLeadership is branded around 'innovation' (Chief Information & Innovation Officer) and the County engages regional tech/AI forums such as the Tampa Technology Summit. Expect interest in AI/data use cases, though specific funded county AI programs should be verified before being treated as committed.
AI InnovationAs a large county and critical-service provider, cyber resilience is a standing priority. Florida runs a Local Government Cybersecurity Grant Program and Cyber Florida (USF, Tampa) resources that counties can leverage — useful funding angles for security infrastructure deals.
Cybersecurity GrantsSustained population growth (~8% since 2020) pressures every service line and the systems behind them — a durable driver for compute, storage, network, and resilient infrastructure investment.
Growth InfrastructureProcurement
Hillsborough County runs its own Procurement Services department and competitive solicitations, and it also buys through cooperative and piggyback contracts. The County's Chapter 10 procurement policy expressly allows cooperative procurement and use of other governments' contracts, with State of Florida and GSA awards exempt from piggyback limits — confirm Dell's coverage on each vehicle before pursuing a deal.
| Vehicle / gate | What it means for Dell |
|---|---|
| Hillsborough County Procurement Services | The County's own competitive solicitations and term contracts — the direct path for larger, county-specific buys. |
| Florida state term contracts | State-negotiated contracts the County may use; piggyback limitations do not apply to State of Florida (or GSA) awards per the County's Chapter 10 policy. |
| Cooperative / piggyback contracts | The County's policy permits cooperative procurement and piggybacking on other government contracts (e.g., national cooperatives such as OMNIA Partners, Sourcewell) to leverage pre-competed pricing — verify Dell's participation on the specific vehicle. |
Spend Signals
GovSpend · as of Aug 10, 2026Dell vs. competitors (spend, payee)
Brand footprint — all channels (est.)
Higher of two conservative lenses: product-name match · manufacturer tag. Both undercount — treat as floors.
Expiring contracts (re-compete)
| Contract | Vendor | Expires |
|---|---|---|
| Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificates | Key Systems USA | Aug 31, 2026 |
| Security Risk Assessment | Guidepost Solutions | Aug 31, 2026 |
| Master Managed Services Agreement | Presidio Networked Solutions | Sep 15, 2026 |
| Low Voltage Cabling Services | T Solutions Corporation | Sep 30, 2026 |
| Oracle Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) Support | Innofin Solutions | Sep 30, 2026 |
| Renewal of Agiloft Professional Extended Edition Hosted Licenses | Agiloft Inc | Sep 30, 2026 |
Open bids / RFPs
| Solicitation | Due |
|---|---|
| Integrated Technical Resources Hub County of Hillsborough | Aug 10, 2026 |
| Customer Billing, Payment, and Engagement Solution County of Hillsborough | Aug 21, 2026 |
- Spend window is Florida's Jul–Jun fiscal year (PO issued 2022-07-01 through 2025-06-30).
- Vendor names combined across variants: "Insight" = Insight Public Sector; "Dell" = Dell Marketing LP + Dell Marketing; "CDW" appears in GovSpend's PO data only as "CDWG."
- Excluded as vendor-name false positives (not the target companies): Motorola Solutions Connectivity (~$16.9M) and Waste Connections Of Florida (~$712K), both matched only via the generic word "Connection"; Total Insight Screening (~$509K) and Insight Global (~$167K), unrelated firms matched via "Insight."
- LineItem.Category returned no results for this agency, so the categories breakdown is omitted.
- Lenovo (product-text) was ~$0 and is omitted; brand and vendor figures are floors from text/name matching, not exhaustive.
- Competitor brand figures on this page were recomputed on 2026-08-05 after the same measurement error found in the Dell totals: the earlier method summed per-keyword buckets, so a line item naming two matched terms (e.g. “HPE ProLiant” or “Apple iPad”) was counted twice. Values here come from a single de-duplicated match over the same keyword set and supersede the earlier, overstated totals.
Power Structure
| Decision-maker | Why they matter |
|---|---|
| Bonnie M. Wise County Administrator | Chief executive carrying out Board of County Commissioners decisions; owns budget preparation and oversees 5,200+ employees. The top executive relationship. |
| Ramin Kouzehkanani Chief Information & Innovation Officer | Executive-team member leading the County's central IT/innovation function; an ORBIE-recognized public-sector CIO and active in regional tech forums. The primary technology decision-maker — verify current standing. |
| Board of County Commissioners (Chair: Ken Hagan; Vice Chair: Christine Miller) Elected governing body (7 members) | Sets policy and approves the budget and major contracts; the appropriations authority behind large technology buys. Hagan retained as 2025–2026 Chair (Nov 2025). A Nov 2026 ballot measure would expand the board to 9 seats and add a 'majority plus one' vote to appoint/remove the County Administrator — watch for governance change. |
| Procurement Services County purchasing & solicitations | Owns competitive solicitations, term contracts, and cooperative/piggyback authority — the gatekeeper for getting on contract. |
News & Signals
Sources
- Hillsborough County — FY26 Budget
- Hillsborough County — County Administrator (Bonnie M. Wise)
- Hillsborough County — Procurement Services
- Hillsborough County — Chapter 10: Cooperative Procurement & Use of Other Government Agency Contracts
- FOX 13 Tampa Bay — Florida DOGE reviewing Hillsborough County's $9 billion budget
- U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts — Hillsborough County, Florida
- FloridaCIO ORBIE Awards / Tampa Technology Summit — Ramin Kouzehkanani, Chief Information & Innovation Officer
- Florida Digital Service — Local Government Cybersecurity Grant Program
- Bay News 9 — DOGE chairman says Hillsborough County report may be overlooked (~$680M; property-tax measure ~$367M)
- WUSF — Hillsborough voters will decide whether to elect school superintendent, expand county commission
- Hillsborough County — Commissioners keep Ken Hagan as 2025–2026 Board Chair (Nov 2025)
- Hillsborough County — County Administrator's Recommended Budget FY26–FY27 (Operating)