Georgia Tech Procurement Assistance Center

Defense dominates experiment in streamlined bidding for innovation

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Streamlined solicitations for innovative commercial products and services, known as commercial solutions openings are beginning to take off in the Defense Department. Even the General Services Administration’s CSO service, which is open to all agencies for a fee, so far has been dominated by Defense users.

CSOs aren’t as well known or broadly used as their procurement-innovation cousin, other transaction authority, which gives agencies the ability to strike contracts outside the Federal Acquisition Regulation for research, prototypes and production to obtain technology from nontraditional defense contractors. Eleven agencies including Defense have OT authority.

GSA’s CSO holds the potential to bring civilian agencies, most of which don’t have OT authority, the ability to reach out to and select suppliers unencumbered by the Federal Acquisition Regulation. So far, civilian agencies haven’t been biting, but Pentagon organizations are, even though they have their own CSO provider.

The very first GSA CSO customer was none other than the Defense Innovation Unit, a once-experimental buying organization that invented CSOs. Originally designed to lure emerging companies to work for the Pentagon by easing the pain of federal procurement processes, the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental, or DIUx, lost the X last summer, when it was designated a permanent outpost for testing defense buying boundaries.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.govexec.com/excellence/management-matters/2019/03/defense-dominates-experiment-streamlined-bidding-innovation/155373/

GAO continues to expand the scope of ‘prototypes’ that DoD may buy through OTs

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The most common question heard about the recent boom in the Department of Defense’s spending on other transactions, or OTs, is a simple one:  How can I get in on the action? 

Understandably, OTs – essentially contracts not subject to procurement laws or regulations like the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) – are very enticing to traditional and nontraditional contractors alike.  And opportunities for OTs abound, particularly since Congress, in 2015, codified the DoD’s authority to award OTs for “prototype projects” (previously just a pilot program) and expanded that authority to include OTs for follow-on production efforts.  But there are limits to DoD’s authority, foremost being that, in general, DoD may acquire only “prototypes” through OTs, and must buy all other goods and services through traditional, FAR-based procurement contracts.

So the question of how to access DoD’s surge in OT funding hinges, among other things, on more specific questions:  What exactly is a “prototype”?   And do my offerings fit the bill?

The answers, it seems, are quite a lot and probably yes.  Congress provided very little legislative direction, instead leaving to DoD the decision over just how broad its authority might reach.  Unsurprisingly, it took a broadminded approach to the term “prototype,” and so far the Government Accountability Office (GAO), as legislative oversight, has upheld the DoD’s expanding interpretation.  This continued in ACI Technologies, Inc., B-417011, Jan. 17, 2019, 2019 CPD ¶ 24, where the GAO found the DoD properly awarded a prototype OT for, among other things, training programs, skills development outreach, and the drafting of best practices for fostering commercial development of secure electronic parts.

Specifically at issue in ACI Technologies was a solicitation by the Naval Surface Warfare Center seeking a firm to manage a consortium of contractors in support of the agency’s Strategic & Spectrum Missions Advanced Resilient Trusted Systems (S2MARTS) initiative.  This initiative’s stated goal is to obtain “innovative technological solutions to address current and future security threats in the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS), trusted microelectronics, and strategic missions hardware environments,” which includes “developing a relationship with industry and academia to establish streamlined processes for obtaining innovative, State-of-the-Art (SOTA) technologies” and “establishing an agile and collaborative working relationship amongst the Government and academia/industry.”

Keep reading this article at: https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/gao-continues-to-expand-the-scope-of-91815/

For more information about OTs, see the Defense Acquisition University’s OT Guide at: https://aaf.dau.mil/ot-guide/

Company calls out ‘old guard’ after Pentagon cuts its $950 million cloud contract by 93 percent

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One week ago, Virginia-based REAN Cloud was preparing to hire an additional 100 employees to meet demand across the Defense Department after it received a $950 million other transaction authority agreement to provide cloud services across Defense agencies.

Now the company is calling out the contracting community that it feels helped successfully pressure the Pentagon to curb its contract award by more than 90 percent — from $950 million to $65 million — and looking for answers from the Defense Department.

“Based on the threat of legal action and protest by the old guard, the only winners in this delay are those large companies that stand to lose money if the Defense Department proceeds with innovation. In the meantime, the cost of maintaining antiquated government infrastructure has not subsided,” said Sekhar Puli, the company’s managing partner, in a statement.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/03/company-calls-out-old-guard-after-pentagon-cuts-its-nearly-1-billion-cloud-contract/146529/

DIUx and DoD ‘other transaction’ prototype agreements: Fast track to DoD funding

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On February 7, 2018 the Department of Defense (DoD) awarded REAN Cloud a contract valued at up to $950 million to work with defense agencies to migrate existing applications to commercial cloud solutions. The award is of significant relevance to efforts currently underway in connection with the upcoming DoD Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure — or “JEDI” — procurement. However, the award is also important in a broader context in that it was issued as a follow-on production contract to an “other transaction” (OT) prototype agreement awarded on an expedited basis by DoD’s Defense Innovation Unit Experimental organization (DIUx). The award, therefore, reflects DoD’s increased comfort with issuing high-value production contracts following preliminary work with DIUx under OT prototype agreements.

In 2015, DoD founded DIUx to increase its access to technical innovations from nontraditional contractors. Defense contractors’ spend on research and development in the last decade has been adversely impacted by increasing budget cuts, protracted procurement cycles, and numerous government shutdowns. As a result, DoD has both needed and wanted access to cutting-edge technology in the commercial sector, but commercial companies with robust global markets have historically been wary of the significant compliance obligations that come with traditional defense procurements. DIUx is the Department’s attempt to contract with these innovators in a way that mimics the speed and terms of commercial transactions and significantly reduces compliance obligations.

Essential to the success of this approach is the use of OT agreements to govern DIUx transactions. According to recent congressional testimony, since it was established, DIUx has awarded 61 OT agreements totaling $145 million and averaging only 78 days from initial contact with a potential partner to signing an agreement. And, beginning in September of last year, DoD has followed some of those DIUx awards with follow-on production contracts. In addition to the recent $950 million award to REAN, DIUx has awarded two more production contracts together valued at up to more than $1 billion. Importantly, DoD can issue these high-value follow-on contracts without competition as long as competition was established for an initial DIUx OT award.

Recent efforts, therefore, suggest that DIUx, OT agreements, and follow-on production contracts are here to stay, and potential contractors of all sizes and sophistication should understand how they may impact the competitive landscape.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.natlawreview.com/article/diux-and-dod-other-transaction-prototype-agreements-fast-track-to-dod-funding

DISA’s new acquisition authority could mean a boost to cyber

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Leaders at the Defense Information Systems Agency hope to use a new acquisition authority to bolster the organization’s cyber efforts.

In May DISA was officially granted what’s known as Other Transaction Authority, which allows the agency to operate outside the usual acquisition methods. The process allows for cost-sharing with vendors and aims to shorten the capability-development cycle and accelerate the transition of prototypes to the government.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.c4isrnet.com/show-reporter/disa-forecast-industry/2017/11/07/disas-new-acquisition-authority-could-mean-a-boost-to-cyber/

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