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January 8, 2021 By cs

Leadership changes at Enterprise Innovation Institute

Karen Fite, who, for the past 18 months has led the Georgia Institute of Technology’s economic development efforts as interim vice president and director of the Enterprise Innovation Institute (EI2), has retired after more than 27 years of service.

David Bridges, director of EI2’s Economic Development Lab (EDL), will assume the interim vice president role effective Jan. 1, 2021.

Karen Fite, who served as interim vice president and director of the Enterprise Innovation Institute (EI2), has retired after 27 years of service. David Bridges, director of EI2’s Economic Development Lab (EDL), has assumed the interim vice president role.

EI2 is the largest and most comprehensive university-based program of business and industry assistance, technology commercialization, and economic development in the United States.

Prior to leading EI2, Fite ran the unit’s Business & Industry Services group of programs, comprised of the Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership (GaMEP), EI2’s largest economic development offering. The group also includes the Safety, Health, and Environmental Services (SHES), Atlanta MBDA Centers, Contracting Education Academy, Georgia Tech Procurement Assistance Center (GTPAC), and the Southeastern Trade Adjustment Assistance Center (SETAAC) programs.

Before taking on that role, Fite was GaMEP director.

“Over the years at Georgia Tech, I have been privileged to serve in a wide variety of capacities — assisting companies with government procurement, their implementation of quality management systems and Lean Manufacturing protocols, the launch of a Lean Healthcare initiative, creating community economic development research and strategic plans, and directing the GaMEP,” Fite said.

“As interim vice president, I have had the opportunity to interact with virtually every EI2 employee. Working with such a talented group of employees of EI2 has been an honor because across the board they are passionate about their work, dedicated to Georgia Tech’s mission of progress and service by serving clients, and continually looking to innovate, improve, and expand our services to help create long lasting and meaningful impact not only in Georgia and across the country, but around the world.”

Chaouki T. Abdallah, Georgia Tech’s executive vice president for research said Fite was a valued member of his leadership team.

“She has been a very effective and engaging leader,” Abdallah said. “She’s brought me solutions, given me critical feedback and has been an invaluable partner. Georgia Tech is lucky to have had her contributions for so long.”

Fite has a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Miami and a bachelor’s in health systems from Georgia Tech. In 2018, she achieved the faculty rank of principal extension professional, Georgia Tech’s highest professional extension faculty rank.

“We are fortunate to have someone of David Bridges’ caliber who can not only build on Karen’s legacy but also brings a wealth of experience and economic development successes,” Abdallah said.

Bridges, who joined EI2 in 1994, authored, co-authored or contributed to more than 100 economic development grants totaling more than $40 million. He assisted in the formation of the two proof-of-concept units — the Global Center for Medical Innovation, a Tech affiliate in the medical device space, and I3L, a health information technology innovation hub.

Beyond Georgia, Bridges helped catalyze the development of the Soft Landings program to bring companies from overseas to the United States. He also helped to establish the I-Corps Puerto Rico program as the National Science Foundation’s first I-Corps program ever offered to teams from that community.

He also supported the expansion of technology extension programs in Chile and Colombia, built a new program in professional development around innovation and technology commercialization, and expanded Georgia Tech’s presence by helping to build startup ecosystems around the Institute’s international campuses and in Latin America.

Bridges and his EDL team have also implemented ecosystem building projects for numerous countries including Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Panama, Costa Rica, Argentina, Guatemala, South Africa, China, Korea, and Japan.

Source: https://news.gatech.edu/2021/01/07/karen-fite-interim-vp-and-director-enterprise-innovation-institute-retires

Filed Under: Georgia Tech News Tagged With: Contracting Academy, contracting education, EI2, Enterprise Innovation Institute, GaMEP, Georgia Tech, GTPAC, MBDA, SETAAC, SHES

January 2, 2020 By cs

Top 10 government contracting news articles of 2019

Folks just like you visited The Contracting Education Academy’s web site over 70,000 times in 2019!  
Visitors took advantage of our daily news feed, learned about Georgia Tech’s support of government projects, checked-out our upcoming acquisition course offerings, and researched numerous acquisition topics.
So, what news developments interested our visitors the most?
Below is a list of the Top 10 news developments of 2019, based on our 45,500 visitors’ interests.  Each one is hyperlinked to the original news story so you can read it again — or perhaps read it for the first time!
  1. Hill AFB’s FARSite to go away on Oct. 1st – Despite the fact that the hugely popular FAR search engine operated by Hill Air Force Base was used 2.3 billion times since its launch in mid-1996, it was decommissioned in 2019 and replaced by Acquisition.gov.
  2. There’s hope that FARSite’s useful features will be incorporated into Acquisition.gov – An uproar from loyal FARSite users — concerned that useful search features and functions would no longer be available — caused Acquisition.gov’s operator, GSA, to reassure users that “… the new site [will provide] the existing capabilities as the current FARSite.”
  3. State Dept. contracting officer indicted for bribery and procurement fraud – According to a Justice Dept. indictment, a State Dept. contracting official and a Turkish construction firm engaged in a bribery and procurement fraud scheme in which the official received cash from the Turkish owner while supervising multi-million dollar construction contracts awarded to the Turkish owner’s business partners.  The contracting official allegedly made over a half million dollars in cash deposits into his personal bank accounts.
  4. What’s your acquisition approach — FAR or non-FAR?  – During 2019, contracting officials increasingly decided to not use a traditional Federal Acquisition Regulation-based acquisition model, opting instead to use Other Transaction Agreements (OTAs).
  5. Section 809 Panel issues summary report of 98 recommendations – A Congressionally-mandated study was released in February calling for reforms in four areas of government acquisition: taking greater advantage of marketplace dynamics; allocating resources more effectively; empowering the acquisition workforce; and simplifying acquisition.
  6. What you don’t know about the Pentagon’s DEOS contract – In March, while the Pentagon’s high-profile Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) procurement was first stalled by legal action, contracting officials were preparing to take bids on its other multibillion cloud procurement, the Defense Enterprise Office Solutions (DEOS) contract.
  7. FedBizOpps to merge with SAM.gov before year’s end – In August, GSA announced that FedBizOpps.gov will migrate to a new SAM.gov site as early as the first quarter of FY20.  The merger took place on Nov. 12 with noticeable delays in the new site’s responsiveness.
  8. Why contracting challenges put VA on the ‘High-Risk’ list – In March, the GAO announced it found that the Department of Veterans Affairs had not updated key purchasing regulations since 2008.
  9. DISA, DSS award second OTA to build governmentwide security clearance system – In July, DoD officials announced they awarded a $75 million ‘other transaction agreement’ (OTA) to build major components of the IT system that will eventually handle all background investigations and security clearance adjudications for federal employees and contractors.
  10. Transition to new FAC-C acquisition workforce training requirements begins Oct. 1, 2019 – New training requirements for the civilian portion of the federal acquisition workforce — aligning the requirements with those developed to support the Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act (DAWIA) contracting certification program — are explained in our article.
Why not make a New Year’s Resolution to visit our website every weekday in 2020?  You’ll benefit by learning about the very latest developments in government acquisition!

 

Filed Under: Academy News Tagged With: acquisition workforce, Contracting Academy, contracting education, federal contracting, Georgia Tech, government contracting, web resources

January 3, 2019 By AMK

We were your source for news about government contracting in 2018

News articles on The Academy’s web site were read 79,583 times in 2018.

Compared to 2017, that represents a 37% increase in content viewed on our web site.

To you — our students, our clients, and visitors — we say Thank You!

We monitor visits to our web site to determine what interests our readers.  Some of the most popular web content was read hundreds and hundreds of times!  Just in case you missed something important last year, listed below are the top 15 most popular news stories, with each one hyper-linked to the full article.

2018’s Top Stories
  1. Higher limits on micropurchase, simplified acquisition thresholds okayed by CAAC
  2. Common feedback to unsuccessful bidders
  3. A practical program manager’s guide to requests for equitable adjustment
  4. SAM hacked: New vendor registrations require paper documentation
  5. When competitors see bid info, the public loses
  6. New rule allows other direct costs and order level materials on GSA Schedule task orders
  7. GAO sustains protest of $771 million Defense Intelligence Agency contract
  8. OTA contracts are the new cool thing in DoD acquisition
  9. How to cut costs and improve performance
  10. GAO sustains Oracle’s ‘other transaction authority’ protest
  11. GAO looks at NAICS code assignments, SBA clarifications, and industry views
  12. Bribes and kickbacks at Joint Base Charleston lead to sentencing
  13. Former COR and a contractor at Eglin Air Force Base plead guilty to conspiracy and bribery
  14. FAR rule implements higher dollar threshold for GAO’s protest jurisdiction over DoD, NASA, Coast Guard task orders
  15. Veterans Affairs wasted close to $2 billion on failed IT projects
The 15 Hottest Topics

What were the most popular topics viewed on The Academy’s web site during 2018?  They are listed below, each hyper-linked to corresponding resources:

  1. Negotiating Rules (10 basic bargaining rules followed by win/win negotiators)
  2. Simplified Acquisition (an explanation of what it is)
  3. Authority for Modifying a Contract (the rules for contract mods)
  4. Interagency Acquisition and GWACs (an explanation, with resources)
  5. Other Transaction Authority (a contract vehicle, growing in popularity, used to help federal agencies rapidly incorporate new technologies)
  6. Buy American Act (news of recent developments in the federal preference for the purchase of domestic supplies and the incorporation of domestic materials into construction projects)
  7. Bribery, Kickbacks and Fraud (news of corruption in government contracting)
  8. Lowest Price Technically Acceptable (trends in LPTA contracting)
  9. Rule of Two (what to do when the CO reasonably expects that at least two eligible small businesses will submit offers and that the award can be made at a fair and reasonable price)
  10. Fat Leonard (developing news about the contract corruption case involving more than 60 admirals and hundreds of other U.S. Navy officers)
  11. Fair and Reasonable Pricing (an explanation of this government standard)
  12. Acquisition Reform (news of the latest developments designed to streamline the federal acquisition Process)
  13. Acquisition Training (the need, the requirements, and the resources)
  14. Micropurchasing (news involving micropurchases)
  15. Acquisition Workforce (developments impacting the government’s acquisition workforce)
Worldwide Interest in the Contracting Academy

While 80 percent of visitors to The Academy’s web site come from all 50 of the United States and the District of Columbia, our analysis shows that personnel on U.S. military bases around the world — as well as contracting officials from federal agencies such as USAID, CDC and the State Department — are among the many international visitors to our site.

The Contracting Education Academy’s web site is popular worldwide. Last year (2018), 50,184 visitors consulted the Academy’s site 60,281 times — viewing our site’s content 79,583 times. Compared to the previous year (2017), these numbers represent a 49% increase in visitors, a 44% increase in visits, and a 37% increase in the content viewed. Our visitors came from all 50 states and 182 countries.
A Pair of New Year’s Resolutions

What do we recommend to you for the New Year?  Two things:

  1. Keep visiting The Academy’s web site for the very latest news and information on government contracting — there is new content posted every business day!  Bookmark this site: http://contractingacademy.gatech.edu/category/government-contracting-news
  2. Stay in touch with our latest training and educational offerings by regularly visiting our course and workshop listing here: http://contractingacademy.gatech.edu/training

Happy New Year!

Filed Under: Academy News Tagged With: Contracting Academy, contracting education, Georgia Tech, government contracting, web resources

January 1, 2018 By AMK

Here’s what interested you in 2017

News items on The Academy’s web site were read more than 57,800 times last year.  

PrintThat’s 15% growth compared to 2016!

To you — our students, our clients, and visitors — we say thank you!

We monitor visits to our web site to determine what interests our readers.  Some of the most popular web content was read hundreds and hundreds of times!  Just in case you missed something important last year, listed below are the top 15 most popular news stories, with each one hyper-linked to the full article.

2017’s Top Stories
  1. Micro-purchase and simplified acquisition thresholds raised for Hurricane Harvey response
  2. DoD raises micro-purchase threshold to $5,000
  3. Changes coming to SAM.gov
  4. How to cut costs and improve performance
  5. A practical program manager’s guide to requests for equitable adjustment
  6. 2017 NDAA restricts DoD’s use of LPTA procedures
  7. Navy officer sentenced in ongoing ‘Fat Leonard’ contract fraud and bribery investigation
  8. Senate passes $700 billion 2018 NDAA, including procurement reforms
  9. Common feedback to unsuccessful bidders
  10. Federal agencies sometimes struggle with creating postings on FedBizOpps
  11. More ‘Fat Leonard’ fallout: Admiral and 8 other officers indicted in fraud and bribery scheme
  12. Alternate FAR search engine is available
  13. CDC contracting official indicted by federal grand jury
  14. IT firm agrees to pay $45 million to settle alleged false claims on GSA contract
  15. DoD contractor agrees to $4.5 million settlement for alleged False Claim Act violations
The 15 Hotest Topics

What were the most popular topics viewed on The Academy’s web site during 2017?  They are listed below, each hyper-linked to corresponding resources:

  1. Negotiating Rules (10 basic bargaining rules followed by win/win negotiators)
  2. Simplified Acquisition (an explanation of what it is)
  3. Authority for Modifying a Contract (the rules for contract mods)
  4. Interagency Acquisition and GWACs (an explanation, with resources)
  5. Bribery, Kickbacks (news of corruption in government contracting)
  6. Lowest Price Technically Acceptable (trends in LPTA contracting)
  7. Fair and Reasonable Pricing (an explanation of this government standard)
  8. Rule of Two (what to do when the CO reasonably expects that at least two eligible small businesses will submit offers and that the award can be made at a fair and reasonable price)
  9. Fat Leonard (developing news about the contract corruption case involving more than 60 admirals and hundreds of other U.S. Navy officers)
  10. Micropurchasing (news involving micropurchases)
  11. Acquisition Training (the need, the requirements, and the resources)
  12. Contracting Officer Representatives (news about and resources for CORs)
  13. Acquisition Workforce (developments impacting the government’s acquisition workforce)
  14. Acquisition Training (the need, the requirements, and the resources)
  15. Government Contracting News (a link to all the latest developments)
Worldwide Interest in the Contracting Academy

While 86 percent of visitors to The Academy’s web site are based in all 50 of the United States, our analysis shows that personnel on U.S. military bases around the world — as well as contracting officials from federal agencies such as USAID, CDC and the State Department — are among the many international visitors to our site.

The Contracting Education Academy’s web site is popular worldwide. During calendar year 2017, 33,726 visitors consulted the Academy’s site 41,901 times — viewing our site’s content 57,901 times. Our visitors came from all 50 states and 163 countries.
A Pair of New Year’s Resolutions

What do we recommend to you for the New Year?  Two things:

  1. Keep visiting The Academy’s web site for the very latest news and information on government contracting — there is new content posted every business day!  Bookmark this site: http://contractingacademy.gatech.edu/category/government-contracting-news
  2. Stay in touch with our latest training and educational offerings by regularly visiting our course and workshop listing here: http://contractingacademy.gatech.edu/training

Happy New Year!

Filed Under: Academy News Tagged With: Contracting Academy, contracting education, Georgia Tech, government contracting, web resources

September 10, 2017 By AMK

Georgia Tech midtown Atlanta campus closed Sept. 11-12 in anticipation of tropical storm

With sustained tropical force winds and heavy rainfall anticipated for metro Atlanta as a result of Hurricane Irma, Georgia Tech has cancelled classes and is closing the midtown Atlanta campus on Monday and Tuesday, September 11-12, 2017.  

This action is in accordance with the governor’s Sunday announcement that state government offices will be closed.

Accordingly, Contracting Education Academy coursework scheduled to take place the week of Sept. 11-15, 2017 has been cancelled.

Georgia Tech’s Office of Emergency Preparedness will continue to monitor the storm’s path. Complete updates regarding the storm’s impact on campus operations will be posted to gatech.edu/irma.

For more information regarding Georgia Tech’s hazardous weather protocols: http://www.gatech.edu/emergency/weather

Filed Under: Georgia Tech News Tagged With: contracting education, Georgia Tech, GTPAC, weather delay

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