Consolidated Questions IdeaLabs Workshops responses.pdf

RFQ 49100424Q0029 Amendment 3 – Consolidated Questions and Answers

No Questions Document Title Section reference

Answers

1 Would the government consider extending the proposal due date to

Monday February 12th at

5pm ET to allow for any necessary proposal modifications following your responses to industry’s queries?

Solicitation

49100424Q0029

Instructions to

Quoters

See Amendments 1 and

2 SF1449 Block 20 states the solicitation is for a Firm

Fixed Price contract for the attached scope of work.

However, Section A.2

CLIN0001 is defined as

Fixed Price with Unit = HR.

Will the Government award

CLIN0001 as FFP with Unit

= LOT or will the

Government award

CLIN0001 as FP with Unit

= HR?

Solicitation

49100424Q0029

SF1449 Block

20 and Section

A.2 CLIN0001

Yes, proposals may submit this as a LOT rather than by unit HR.

3 Please provide the frequency of invoicing that will be awarded, e.g.

monthly.

Solicitation

49100424Q0029

Invoicing Invoicing is monthly for this FFP requirement.

4 Section A.4 52.212-4 paragraph (g) (iv) requires

“Description, quantity, unit of measure, unit price and extended price of the items delivered” on invoices.

Will the Government require labor categories, number of hours, and labor rates to be included on invoices for CLIN0001 or will the Government require only Description = LABOR with an extended price equivalent to the agreed

Solicitation

49100424Q0029

Section A.4

52.212-4 (g)(iv)

Invoices for FFP requirements may bill at a flat monthly amount for a portion of the FFP value, and do not need to provide hourly breakouts for the invoice.

upon portion of the total

FFP for CLIN0001?

5 Could you please clarify the discrepancy between

Section III. Performance

Period, which mentions

“Base Quantity: four workshops”, and Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables, in the table where it mentions “Short day event facilitation (4 events)" and below it states

“Three day, in-person Event

Facilitation” Specifically, could you detail the expected number of events for each category?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section III.

Performance

Period and

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

See Amendment 1.

6 Will the virtual platform need to accommodate event registration?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

No. this will be handled separately.

7 Would NSF be open to the contractor managing venue logistics such as meals during workshop?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

No. The location, registration and other logistics are handled separately.

8 Are there expected dates and locations for the in-person events? If so, can those please be provided?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

See Amendment 1.

9 In the Deliverables section, where it mentions

"Materials to provide attendees in each session," could you specify the types of materials expected to be provided?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

Detailed workshop agenda, workshop guidance and instructions etc. These will be developed in collaboration with the

NSF Program Officers.

10 The SOW states in the

Project Coordination section that the contractor will facilitate agenda designs and activities. What level of collaboration will the contractor have with

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

We expect this to be a very close collaboration.

NSF in developing the content for these events?

11 It is our understanding that

NSF will identify and select the mentors. Will they be paid by the contractor?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section V.

Scope of Work and

Deliverables

Yes, NSF will identify and select the mentors.

No, the contractor will not pay for them. That will be handled separately.

12 It states that in-person events will take place at a conference facility TBD.

Does this imply that NSF will provide the venue, or will it be our responsibility to secure the venue?

Attachment 1

SOW

Section VII.

Place of

Performance

No, the contractor will not be responsible for that. NSF will handle it under a separate logistics contract.

13 Regarding the requirement

"virtual platform to serve as an online collaboration hub at the conclusion of in-person workshop", how long should the virtual platform live on after the event is over?

Attachment 1

SOW

V. Scope of

Work and

Deliverables

About 3 (min) to 5

(max) months.

14 Would the government be interested in any virtual networking activities outside of the main brainstorming sessions? For example, virtual speed networking?

Attachment 1

SOW

V. Scope of

Work and

Deliverables

Yes.

15 Can the government confirm that the contractor will not support any coordination or facilitation of the initial Selection

Panel, or the “Call for

Participants” described in the NSF PAPPG Chapter

II.F.6?

Attachment 1

SOW /

NSF PAPPG

Section IV.

Overview of

Project / NSF

PAPPG Chapter

II.F.6

Government does not expect the contract to the support these activities.

16 Does this requirement have a historical contract/done before?

No, this requirement does not have an incumbent contractor.

17 Does "Neutral" reference mean there is no assigned count or evaluation?

Past Performance is strictly delineated by law and regulation, and quoters with no relevant past performance must be rated in a neutral fashion that is not positive or negative.

18 The travel states quantity 4 with associated cost; is this just max quantity of people and/or times to travel within the period of performance?

The quantity relates to the number of planned workshops. All travel is to be approved in advance by the CO or

COR, and the travel is provided as a plug figure to ensure parity of evaluation among quotations.

19 How will the Workshop

Directors choose the topics for each Ideas Lab? Is support for topic selection

(brainstorming, literature review, identifying researchers in a topic or discipline, performing discovery interviews, landscape analysis) included as part of the work for the Contractor in the

“technical preparation and delivery of four interactive short-day virtual events?”

Yes. NSF Program officers and the

Workshop Director(s) will collaborate closely with the contractor in developing these as part of the agenda development.

20 How will the Workshop participants be selected and what role will the

Contractor personnel have in identifying those individuals?

Workshop participants will be selected by NSF with the help of a

Selection Panel. NSF will welcome contractor’s input though it is not mandatory. NSF makes the final decisions.

21 Will the four workshops need to be run serially or in parallel?

See Amendment 1

22 Will the chosen contractor be in charge of selecting or scheduling the initial participants that will be involved in the Idea Lab?

No.

23 Will the chosen contractor be responsible for identifying and scheduling the panelists that will be involved in the Idea Lab?

No.

24 Does NSF have a preferred tool for the Virtual Hub? If yes, does NSF already have licenses set aside and allocated for this tool?

No.

25 If NSF does not have a preferred tool for the

Virtual Hub, will the chosen contractor be responsible for supplying the licenses and including those costs in this proposal?

Yes.

26 Given Materials (CLIN 2) will vary widely based on final decisions during the design phase (workshop exercises selected, documentation included in the workshop, virtual hub software selection, hybrid

vs. virtual vs. in-person, etc.) will the government consider only evaluating

Labor (CLIN 1) and instead, just confirm that

Materials is in alignment with the technical approach? Or alternatively, will NSF consider providing us with a plug-in number (like what was provided for CLIN 3) for easy comparison across all responses?

The contractor may assume material costs at not to exceed $10k level per event.

27 For in-person Idea Labs, has NSF already chosen a preferred location or city?

Yes. The first three will be held at a location within driving distance of NSF headquarters in

Alexandria. The last one TBD.

28 For the four Idea Lab sessions, please breakdown how many of the sessions will be virtual, hybrid, and in-person.

All 4 of them will be hybrid. Each one will have 3-day in-person workshop along with virtual sessions before and after the in-person workshop.

29 Please confirm if the contractor can invoice monthly based on the prorated portion of the fixed price or if the contractor will be required to invoice after each deliverable is accepted.

Yes, see Question 3 response.

30 Can an academic Institution submit a proposal or is this limited to for-profit companies only?

This is a small business set-aside, all quoters must still be considered a small business under

NAICS code 541611 per their SAM.gov registration.

31 Is this limited to organizing the collaboration events only in Alexandria, VA area?

No.

32 Is there a set date planned for the first workshop?

See Amendment 1

33 What is the expected timeline for the proposal review and contract award?

This requirement is issued as a simplified commercial solicitation, and is expected to be evaluated and awarded relatively shortly after the date for quotations.

34 CLIN 0001 is listed as a

FFP clin, but the unit of measurement is "HR". Is this intended as a Time and

Materials component? Is the unit of measurement supposed to be "EA" to represent the cost of "One

Workshop"?

The CLIN information is provided as an illustrative example, see the answer to Question

2.

35 CLIN 0002 is listed as a

T&M clin, but the unit of

As above, CLIN structure is illustrative.

measurement is "EA". Is this also intended?

Offerors may propose other units of measure.

The Materials CLIN usage is described in the instructions to offerors.

36 The SOW calls for potential online, hybrid, or in person events. These differences significantly affect the cost/price to provide both workshop services and materials. For which instance would you prefer us to quote a price? Are multiple pricing options for type of event requested?

All 4 of them will be hybrid. Each one will have 3-day in-person workshop along with virtual sessions before and after the in-person workshop.

37 How many past performance questionnaires are desired/allowed?

There is no strictly required number, and greater or lesser numbers will not prejudice the evaluation of past performance.

Offerors do not need to provide more than three.

38 For in-person events, is the plan to host all of these at the Eisenhower building in

Alexandria? If not, are there specific offsite forums being considered? Will these off-site options be additional ODCs determined after the fact?

The first three will be held at a location within driving distance of NSF headquarters in

Alexandria (not at NSF building). The last one

TBD.

39 Concerning proposal submission, the quote format asks for "one electric copy" of the quotation, but the following section calls for three separate volumes.

Does NSF prefer all three volumes to be included in one file, or three separate files to distinguish between

Separate volumes in the same email are preferred, to clearly distinguish between the three volumes. The one electronic copy refers to a single email communication, in lieu of multiple emails.

administrative, non-price, and price factors?

40 Are you intending to have 4 different topics – 1 topic for each of 4 Ideas Labs?

Would each Ideas Lab need different directors and mentors? (There would be different scenarios based on these questions)

Yes. They will be on different topics.

41 Would you like us to add travel to the quote or include it as being reimbursed? If it must be included and match government per diem rates, we would need dates and locations for the in-person events. If that isn't possible, may we could quote our standard rates for now?

In order to ensure uniformity of evaluation, offerors should use the plug figures. The actual travel must be approved in advance and will be booked at the government rates or will deviate only as approved by the CO or

COR.