RFP 2008-N-10242 IRR Business Q As FINAL.doc

Business Questions and Answers

Request for Proposals (RFP) 2008-N-10242

CDC Influenza Reagent Resource (CDC-IRR)

1. Question:

No reference is made as to who is responsible for the costs for shipping of the reagents. Our assumption is that the government intends to pay all shipping costs as part of the contract.

Answer:

Contractor is responsible for all “approved” shipping costs.

2. Question:

Section L.8(b)I Absolute Criteria for Eligibility states that the “offeror” is

USDA–approved BSL3 Enhanced or, USDA–approved BSL3 teamed with an USDA-approved BSL3+laboratory. In addition, select agent registration is required. Does the definition of the “offeror” in this requirement include subcontractors? For example, is it acceptable for the prime contractor who owns no BSL facilities and thus has no select agent registration, to satisfy this requirement through a subcontractor team member who has all the requisite facilities and registrations?

Answer:

Yes. The RFP facilities requirement is intended to ensure that appropriate laboratory facilities are currently available, to be utilized by either the contractor or one of the contractor’s teaming partners (which would include subcontractors). Whichever facility would be responsible for work that must be performed under BSL3 or BSL-3 Enhanced laboratory conditions that facility must be USDA–approved BSL3 Enhanced or, USDA–approved BSL3 teamed with an USDA-approved BSL3+laboratory. In addition, select agent registration is required.

3. Question:

In light of the unknowns that are still to be answered, XXX would like to request a 3 week extension to the due date of the proposal.

To be considered for award of this contract, competitive proposals must be received by no later than 3:30PM on July 21, 2008, as specified in Item 9 of the RFP – page 1.

4. Question:

Reference Section L.8(b)I. Recognizing that the FAR stipulates

“Contractor teaming arrangements may be particularly appropriate in complex research and development acquisitions,” would the Government please confirm our understanding of Section L.8 (b) I. ABSOLUTE CRITERIA FOR ELIGIBILITY. Specifically, is an Offeror’s Team (comprised of the prime contractor and subcontractor teammates) eligible for award as long the Prime contractor’s technical proposal demonstrates that the Prime or one of its Subcontractors is USDA-approved BSL3 Enhanced; or, USDA-approved BSL3 Enhanced Laboratory, and is Select Agent registered? In this case, all Team members proposed to possess, use, and transfer select agents and toxins will be actively registered and in full compliance with 42 CFR Part 73 and/or 9 CFR Part 121 and 7 CFR Part 331, as appropriate.

See the government’s response to Question 2.

5. Question:

Reference Section I, Contract Clauses. The contract will include FAR 52.

222.41 Service Contract Act of 1965 (Nov 2007). Will the Contracting

Officer be providing a Wage Determination for this procurement?

Yes. Wage Determination will be included in amendment 2. Cost proposal submissions should reflect personnel costs based on current actual salaries of proposed personnel. Cost proposal submissions should also contain clear bases for computation of proposed costs for proposed personnel (hours x hourly rate = cost).

6. Question:

Reference Section C, II (Project Objectives), last paragraph (Quantity B

Items) – states that additional funding would be made available to meet anticipated surge (Quantity B – Option) requirements yet the Section B.3 tables don’t include locations for Option B pricing. Will Section B be revised or can the government provide guidance on how or where to bid the Quantity B - Option price?

Section B.3 will be revised and included in amendment 2.

7. Question:

Reference Section J – List of Attachments. None of the attachments listed were provided with the solicitation document. Can you please provide the attachments listed?

Attachments have been uploaded in FedBizOpps.

8. Question:

Reference Section L.4(b)(1). Requirements for Cost or Pricing Data says cost or pricing data is required and L.9(b) Business Proposal Instructions that states that offerors are not required to submit cost or pricing data. Please confirm that cost or pricing data is not required as part of our proposal submission per L.9(b).

OTHER THAT CERTIFIED COST AND PRICING DATE (COST BREAKDOWN) IN SUPPORT OF ALL PROPOSALS IS REQUIRED in accordance with the Federal Acquisition Regulations (Table 15-2). Amendment 2 will include the requirement that cost or pricing data will be required.

9. Question:

Reference Section L.7(d). The solicitation number referenced on the last line of the address appears to be incorrect. Please confirm that offerors should use Solicitation No. 2008-N-10242.

Section L.7(d) of the RFP contains a typographical error. Mailing labels for proposals submitted in response to this RFP should specify

“Solicitation No. 2008-N-10242”.

10. Question:

Reference Section L, L.6. The offeror is required to demonstrate overall Small Disadvantaged Business participation. Where is this data to be provided within the offer? Is it acceptable to address this requirement in the Small Business Subcontracting Plan (Section L.9.e.)?

Business proposal submissions should contain a separate section to address proposed small and disadvantaged business participation.

Please refer to Section L.9(e) Small Business Subcontracting Plan, and

Section M.2, Evaluation of Small Disadvantaged Business Factor (Jul

2000) for additional guidance in this area.

11. Question:

Reference Section L, L.11.1.Will the Government please define “major” subcontractors?”

Proposals should contain past performance information for any proposed subcontractor who would be performing significant aspects of the work requirements of this project.

12. Question:

Given the considerable impact that CDC response to our questions will have on pricing and scheduling, would the Government consider extending the proposal due date by two weeks?

To be considered for award of this contract, competitive proposals must be received by no later than 3:30PM on July 21, 2008, as specified in Item 9 of the RFP – page 1.

13. Question:

Are small businesses without a track record of receiving Federal

Government Contracts eligible to respond to this contract as main contractors?

Yes. The government will evaluate all timely proposals received in accordance with the criteria specified in Section M of the RFP.

14.

Question:

Section L.9 B states that “offerors are not required to submit cost or pricing data”, however Section L.4 FAR 52.215-20 appears only to be applicable when cost or pricing data are required. Therefore we request that Section L.4, Requirements for Cost or Pricing Data, be removed from the solicitation for consistency.

Answer:

Please see USG’s response to question 8.

15.

Question:

Section B, page 7 requires "Total Aggregate Cost (Base and all options years)". Does the Government intend for this amount to include the total cost and fee for all years?

Yes. This item should reflect the total estimated “cost plus fixed fee” for

Years 1-10.

16. Question:

Given the indication in Section B that this will be a Cost-Plus-Fixed-Fee contract, will the Government add FAR 52.216-8 "Fixed Fee" to the RFP?

Yes. FAR clause 52.216-8 will be added to the solicitation by the way of an amendment.

17.

Question:

Section L.3 item #2, references "the first page of the proposal". Does this refer to the first page of the business volume only or both the business and technical volumes? If so, this conflicts with L.9(a) which states the "Contract Form (page 1)" which appears to be page 1. Please clarify.

Section L.3 Item (2) refers to information that should be set forth in a cover letter, transmitting the technical and cost proposal packages. Section L.9 outlines instructions for the business proposal submission. “The contract form found in Part I, Section A” refers to page 1 of the RFP.

18.

Question:

Section C. II "Project Objectives" implies that this will be a cost reimbursement requirements type contract". Does the Government intend to include FAR 52.216-21 to Section I.

No. This contract will be funded annually at time of award (and concurrent with exercise of each subsequent year option period) to meet the anticipated routine (Quantity “A”) needs of the government.

As indicated in Section C.I of the RFP, this contract is a critical component of the CDC’s extramural efforts to ensure the availability of influenza viruses and reagents for public health responses. FAR 52.216-21 requirements that work be initiated by issuance of delivery or task orders would be totally impractical, unnecessarily burdensome and inconsistent with the goals and objectives of this contract. Please refer to Section C.II of the RFP, which clarifies in detail how the contractor’s acquisition, production and manufacturing plans will be used to ensure that contractor inventory levels are maintained in accordance with current government priorities.

19.

Section J lists 8 attachments, however, it does not appear that these attachments were included with the RFP. We request that these attachments be included.

Attachments have been uploaded in FedBizOpps 20.

For Section L.7 item h, is it acceptable to submit electronic versions of proposal as an Adobe PDF file instead of Word?

Yes, as long as Adobe PDF file is searchable, i.e., allows searching for text.

21.

Section L.7(e) "Small Business Subcontracting Plan" references Section J, Attachment 22. However, Section J only contains 8 attachments. Please clarify.

Section L.9 (e) references Section J, Attachment 22. This is a mistake and will be corrected by an amendment. Reference should have been made to attachments J.4 and J.5.

22.

Section L.7 references a different RFP number. Please clarify and correct if necessary.

Section L.7(d) of the RFP contains a typographical error. Mailing labels for proposals submitted in response to this RFP should specify “Solicitation No. 2008-N-10242”. This error will be corrected by an amendment.

23.

Question:

For Section L.9(e)(4), is it acceptable for the offerors to make a statement that it has no current commitments that interfere with performing this contract in lieu of listing any current commitments with the Government? Some companies may have hundreds to several hundreds of contracts that relate to this work and listing all of these would be difficult.

Difficulty of responding to this requirement notwithstanding, if any of the proposed personnel for this contract are currently working on other Government contracts, this must be made clear in the offeror’s business proposal for this RFP.

24.

Question:

Section L.11 requires three completed contracts and three contracts in progress for past performance for a total of six. Are these six past performance references inclusive of major subcontractors or does the offeror and major subcontractors each have to provide a total of six?

This information is required for the offeror and each major subcontractor, i.e., if the offeror is proposing to team with two major subcontractor, this information should be furnished for a total of 18 contracts.

25.

Question:

Section M.2 requires the submission of a Small Disadvantaged Business Participation Plan, however, Section L does not state where in the proposal this should be included. Please clarify if the Small Disadvantaged Business Participation Plan should be included as part of the Business Volume.

The Small Disadvantaged Business Participation Plan should be submitted as part of the business proposal.

26.

Section I contains FAR 52.226-4 "Notice of Disaster or Emergency Area set-Aside" and -5 "Restrictions on Subcontracting Outside Disaster or

Emergency Area". These clauses do not appear to be applicable to this procurement. We request that they be removed.

These clauses will be removed by the way of an amendment.

27.

Section I contains FAR 52.246-20 "Warranty of Services" which does not seem to apply to cost reimbursement contracts. We request that this FAR clause be removed.

FAR clause 52.246-20, Warranty of Services, will be removed from the solicitation and FAR clause FAR 52.246-5, Inspection of Services - Cost-Reimbursement, will be added to the contract by the way of an amendment.

29.

Question:

Section L.9(d) requires that staff be identified by labor category. Is it acceptable to identify proposed staff by their name instead of by a labor category since there are no specified labor categories and/or qualifications provided in the RFP?

The government does not anticipate award of a labor hours type contract.

Both technical and cost proposals should identify proposed personnel by name and job title.

30. Question:

Section L.9(d) "Staffing Plan" requires the inclusion of hourly rates.

Please clarify whether these are salary rates or fully loaded rates.

The government anticipates award of a cost reimbursement type contract.

Business proposal submissions should reflect unloaded hourly rates for proposed personnel. Further, proposed Year 1 rates should be based on current actual salaries and reflect clear basis for computation (i.e., hourly rate x proposed hours = proposed cost); and, the business proposal should contain the offeror’s justification/rationale for proposed salary escalation during Years 2-10 of the contract.

31.

Question:

Section A, Number 5 under "Intellectual Property Rights" and "Government Ownership of Materials" appear to conflict with Section I FAR 52.227-14. We request that the two Section A clauses be removed

There is no conflict. FAR 52.227-14 provides that “the

Contractor shall have the right to use, release to others, reproduce, distribute, or publish any data first produced or specifically used by the

Contractor in the performance of this contract, except (1) as prohibited by Federal law or regulation (e.g., export control or national security laws or regulations); (2) as expressly set forth in this contract; or, (3) if the Contractor receives or is given access to data necessary for the performance of this contract that contain restrictive markings, the Contractor shall treat the data in accordance with such markings unless specifically authorized otherwise in writing by the Contracting Officer.”

The government’s intent concerning “Intellectual Property Rights” and “Government Ownership of Materials” under the contemplated contract are expressly set forth in Sections A.5.a and A.5.b of the RFP.

32.

Question:

Section I contains FAR 52.227-3 "Patent Indemnity", however this clause does not appear to apply to the services required to be performed under this program. We request that you remove this clause from the RFP.

FAR 52.227-3, Patent Indemnity meets the prescription for use at FAR

27.201-2(c)(1), and will remain a part of this RFP and any resultant contract.

33.

Does the RFP require the offeror to estimate costs for both Quantity A and

Quantity B quantities as listed in Appendix A to the SOW?

Yes. Please see the government’s response to Question 6.