The Contracting Education Academy

Contracting Academy Logo
  • Home
  • Training & Education
  • Services
  • Contact Us
You are here: Home / Archives for sole source

September 4, 2020 By cs

VA awards sole source contract to upgrade, automate its COVID-19 visualization tool

Contracting officials justified the $1.5 million award by citing a $6 million price tag to fully replace the tool.

The Veterans Affairs Department is using a specific data visualization tool in its fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and recently awarded a $1.5 million sole source contract to upgrade and automate the software.

VA awarded a contract to Four Points Technology through NASA’s governmentwide acquisition contract Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement, or SEWP, to acquire, integrate and maintain the latest version of Edge Technologies’ visualization tools.

While VA already uses Edge Technologies’ software to visualize patient data, the current tools rely on outdated Adobe Flash players with security holes, among other issues. Under the new contract, VA will be upgrading to the EdgeCore tool, which is based on HTML5 and comes with a host of other improvements.

“This acquisition will provide additional visualization and integration capabilities, eliminate security vulnerabilities related to Adobe Flash used in the current version, enhance 508 Disability Compliance, and provide new robotic process automation features,” according to the award announcement.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/analytics-data/2020/08/va-awards-sole-source-contract-upgrade-automate-its-covid-19-visualization-tool/167965/

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: coronavirus, COVID-19, pandemic, SEWP, sole source, VA

July 17, 2020 By cs

Former HR official steered sole-source $5 million training contract to friends, VA’s IG says

A former top human resources executive at the Department of Veterans Affairs improperly steered a contract to benefit two of his friends, the agency’s inspector general found in a recent report.

Peter Shelby, who briefly served as VA’s assistant secretary for human resources and administration, violated ethics laws and abused his position to award a $5 million contract to two friends.

The contract “resulted entirely in waste,” James Mitchell, VA’s acting assistant inspector general, said.

The contract was for leadership development and training for VA employees and applicant assessment tools. Shelby was friendly with the owner of the service-disabled veteran-owned small business that received the $5 million contract. He was also friends with the vice president of Blanchard, one of the subcontractors on the project, who had endorsed Shelby for the assistant secretary position back in 2017.

According to the IG, Shelby directed his staff to pursue a contract with the small business under a specific VA sole-source authority, which allows the department, under limited circumstances, to avoid the usual competitive bidding procedures. But in this case, those authorities were misused to benefit Shelby and the preferred small business, the IG said.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/veterans-affairs/2020/07/former-va-chco-steered-5m-training-and-development-contract-to-friends-ig-says/

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: abuse, ethics, fraud, HR, SDVOSB, set-aside, sole source, training, VA. IG

March 24, 2020 By cs

Agencies initiate emergency acquisition authorities

The Defense Department raised its threshold for 8(a) sole source contracts to $100 million as required by the 2020 Defense authorization bill. While not related to coronavirus outbreak, the timing is important.

At least four agencies have implemented emergency acquisition authorities to make it easier to award contracts to support coronavirus relief efforts.

The General Services Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the IRS raised the micro-purchase threshold (MPT) and the simplified acquisition threshold (SAT) in the last week.

The Defense Department on March 17 raised the threshold for sole source 8(a) contracts to $100 million as required under the 2020 Defense authorization bill.

This is a huge increase, given typically the threshold for 8(a) contracts at DoD has been $22 million.  Congress increased the threshold for the first time since 2015.

For the rest of the government, the 8(a) sole source threshold is $7 million for manufacturing requirements or $4 million for all other requirements.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/acquisition-policy/2020/03/agencies-initiate-emergency-acquisition-authorities/

The Contracting Education Academy at Georgia Tech has established a webpage where all contract-related developments related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) are summarized.  Find the page at: https://contractingacademy.gatech.edu/coronavirus-information-for-contracting-officers-and-contractors/

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: 8(a), acquisition workforce, contractor performance, coronavirus, COVID-19, DoD, micropurchase, SAT, simplified acquisition threshold, sole source, threshold

March 5, 2020 By cs

GAO declines to limit DoD’s ‘experimental purchasing’ authority

In its recent decision in Air Tractor, Inc., the Government Accountability Office (GAO) held that the Department of Defense (DoD) may, at its own discretion, begin a project with agreements under its prototyping Other Transaction (OT) authority, and award later phases of the same project on a sole source basis under its experimental purchasing authority.

In the decision, GAO discussed distinctions between these avenues, and gave a broad reading to the DoD’s authority to award contracts for experimental work.

The past few years have seen a swell of interest in DoD’s ability to sidestep the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) and use more flexible OT authority to enter into contracts.  Thus far, the majority of this interest has centered on DoD’s OT authority to enter into prototype projects, now codified at 10 U.S.C. § 2371b.

One of the most powerful features of DoD’s prototype OT authority is that DoD may award a sole source follow-on production contract for a successful prototype. Congress included some limitations on this authority to award sole source follow-on production contracts at 10 U.S.C. § 2371b(f).   For example, in its decision in Oracle America, Inc., GAO confirmed that DoD must comply with all notice and other specific preconditions at the prototyping stage in order to award a sole source follow-on production contract.

However, prototype OT authority is not DoD’s only authority to award sole source contracts. The Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) itself allows for sole source awards in certain circumstances. In DRS Sustainment Systems, GAO held that DoD need not comply with 10 U.S.C. § 2371b(f) to award a sole source production contract where DoD invokes one of CICA’s exceptions to separately justify the sole source award.  In addition, under 10 U.S.C. § 2373, DoD has authority to make sole source purchases for items it “considers necessary for experimental or test purposes in the development of the best supplies that are needed for the national defense.”

In Air Tractor, GAO held that DoD properly relied on its “experimental purchasing” authority under 10 U.S.C. § 2373 to purchase a set of full production light attack aircraft for use in “experiments” to determine the best use of such planes in combat support.  GAO found that this purchase was acceptable because it met the requirements of § 2373 alone, regardless of the Air Force’s initial use of its § 2371b prototype OT authority to compare various candidate aircraft.  GAO confirmed that while it will exercise jurisdiction to ensure agency compliance with various statutory authorities to award non-procurement contracts, GAO will not impose requirements beyond those stated in the statutes.  In upholding the Air Force’s acquisition strategy, the Air Tractor decision provides valuable insight as to the broad scope of § 2373 “experimental purchasing” authority.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.mondaq.com/unitedstates/Government-Public-Sector/895672/GAO-Declines-To-Limit-DoD39s-Experimental-Purchasing-Authority

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: acquisition strategy, Air Force, CICA, competition, DoD, experimental purchasing authority, experimentation, FAR, GAO, OTA, other transaction authorities, other transaction authority, prototype, prototyping, sole source

April 3, 2019 By AMK

ATF rushed sole-source contracts without market research, watchdog finds

In its efforts to meet small business contracting goals, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives neglected proper market research and record-keeping before awarding sole-source contracts, a watchdog found.

“Proper documentation is necessary to show that ATF safeguarded federal funds, furthered the purpose of small business programs, and complied with sole-source contracting authorities,” wrote the Justice Department inspector general in a report released on March 14th.

“ATF did not maintain complete contract files and could not demonstrate that it had conducted required market research before awarding several sole-source contracts,” auditors found in a review of 16 sole-source contracts totaling $56 million to nine small businesses in 2016-2017.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.govexec.com/contracting/2019/03/atf-rushed-sole-source-contracts-without-market-research-watchdog-finds/155640/

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: acquisition planning, ATF, DOJ, IG, Justice Dept., market research, OIG, small business, sole source

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • …
  • 8
  • Next Page »

Popular Topics

abuse acquisition reform acquisition strategy acquisition training acquisition workforce Air Force Army AT&L bid protest budget budget cuts competition cybersecurity DAU DFARS DHS DoD DOJ FAR fraud GAO Georgia Tech GSA GSA Schedule GSA Schedules IG industrial base information technology innovation IT Justice Dept. Navy NDAA OFPP OMB OTA Pentagon procurement reform protest SBA sequestration small business spending technology VA
Contracting Academy Logo
75 Fifth Street, NW, Suite 300
Atlanta, GA 30308
info@ContractingAcademy.gatech.edu
Phone: 404-894-6109
Fax: 404-410-6885

RSS Twitter

Search this Website

Copyright © 2023 · Georgia Tech - Enterprise Innovation Institute