The innovation team at 18F has created a tool to help the General Services Administration (GSA) forecast the purchasing needs of federal agencies.

The open source tool displays contract forecasting opportunities targeted to small-business owners and lets users filter and search by keywords, according to a May 2 blog post by 18F. Previously, GSA was forecasting using a spreadsheet with dozens of columns and hundreds of rows that had to be updated manually.

GSA’s Office of Small Business Utilization, or OSBU, is required to compile projections of contracting opportunities that owners of small, disadvantaged businesses and women-owned businesses may be able to compete for, the blog stated, but GSA was publishing only its own agency data.

That meant businesses had to go to dozens of agency web sites to find forecast information for those agencies.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/new-tool-digitizes-feds-purchase-forecasts-targets-small-business-users/2016-05-03

See the new contract forecasting tool at: https://gsaforecast.gsa.gov/