Electronic Capital Planning Investment Control (eCPIC)

What is eCPIC?
How does eCPIC benefit me?
What regulatory requirements does eCPIC address?
Who maintains eCPIC?
How do I get more information about eCPIC?
Who do I contact within the Department for more information about eCPIC?

What is eCPIC?

Electronic Capital Planning Investment Control Technology (eCPIC) is a government-owned technology system (GOTS) that is designed to help Federal agencies in the management and control of their initiatives, portfolios, and investment priorities. This web-based application assists managers and staff involved in IT planning in assessing IT investments in terms of their costs, risks, and expected returns. eCPIC creates a portfolio of IT investments to meet mission goals.

How does eCPIC benefit me?

eCPIC supports the selection, control, and evaluation phases of the IT capital planning and investment control process. Specifically, eCPIC provides a self-documenting business case for investments; a central repository of cost, risk, and mission support information; and on-line access to information about individual IT capital planning initiatives and the entire IT investment portfolio. It helps to focus IT investments on an organization's critical missions, goals, and objectives and helps to reduce the risk associated with IT investments.

eCPIC supports internal and external reporting requirements, allowing the Department of Commerce to file OMB Circular A-11 reports (Exhibit 300 and Exhibit 53) electronically. Specifically, eCPIC stores the Exhibit 300 Capital Asset Plans and Business Cases and converts them to XML format using an OMB-provided schema. eCPIC also automatically extracts data from the Exhibit 300s to generate the Exhibit 53, IT Investment Portfolio spreadsheet. This eliminates DOC's various Operating Units from having to manually generate and validate fifty plus Exhibit 300s and an integrated Exhibit 53 for submission to OMB. Internally, eCPIC is used to facilitate management of DOC's IT portfolio.

What regulatory requirements does eCPIC address?

In recent years, Congress has passed several pieces of legislation designed to define better Federal agency roles and responsibilities for the stewardship of information resources and to help agencies better manage the investment of public funds in information technology.

The Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996 requires Federal agencies to focus on the results achieved through IT investments while streamlining the Federal IT procurement process. Specifically this Act introduces more rigor and structure into how agencies approach the selection and management of IT investments. Among other mandates, the head of each agency is required to implement a process for maximizing the value and assessing and managing the risks of the agency's IT investments.

The Government Performance and Results Act requires agencies to set goals, measure performance, and report on their accomplishments. An agency's IT investments should directly support the accomplishment of these goals. The Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act (FASA) requires agencies to define cost, schedule, and performance goals for federal acquisition programs (to include IT projects) and monitor these programs to ensure that they remain within prescribed tolerances.

eCPIC helps managers address the requirements of the legislation with the goal of delivering IT projects on time, within budget, and providing the intended features.

Who maintains eCPIC?

eCPIC is funded by a coalition of Federal agencies via a Service Level Agreement. The Service Level Agreement (SLA) is used to fund maintenance of the system, plus develop functional enhancements. The SLA also provides documentation, technical support, and help desk services to participating agencies.

Representatives from agencies participating in the SLA make up the eCPIC Change Management Committee (CMC). The functional content and usability of eCPIC are controlled by the CMC, which approves all revisions and major upgrades. DOC helps fund the SLA and is an active member of the Change Management Committee

At Commerce, the Office of the Chief Information Officer maintains and administers eCPIC. Commerce operating units are users of the system and do not need to maintain the software.

How do I get more information about eCPIC?

The public Web site for eCPIC is the eCPIC Resource Center (IRC). The IRC is maintained through the SLA. It provides a general overview of eCPIC, as well as an opportunity for agencies to test drive eCPIC via a demonstration site.

Who do I contact within the Department for more information about eCPIC?

Stuart Simon (Ssimon@doc.gov, 202-482-0275).

Published 8/15/2001; Revised 9/20/2004