One_on_One_QA_4-5Mar19.pdf

One-on-One Questions and Responses march 4 -5

1. Lab safety is described at a high level in SOW paragraph 5 and then also covered in several paragraphs in sections 6. Why is that?

Ans: Section 5 of the SOW talks to the high level competencies of FILMSS 2. The actual requirements for facility safety manager varies from customer to customer. For example, in an office cubicle environment, the requirement would be to check plugs, extension cords are plugged in appropriately and file cabinets are bolted to the wall. In a lab, the requirements will be totally different and much more involved.

2. Is there a specific vision for FILMSS 2?

Ans: There is no official vision for FILMSS 2. Key components are to maintain flexibility and maintain a cadre of professionals who could easily serve multiple organizations.

3. Currently phase in cost is included in the total price being evaluated. Would you consider excluding phase in and only evaluating it for reasonableness to level the playing field?

Ans: Including the phase in cost with the total price being evaluated is in the best interest of the Government.

4. Can salary data of incumbents be provided?

Ans: This information cannot be provided.

5. There used to be a matrix in the draft SOW from the RFI. Will this be made available again?

Ans: The previous version of the SOW didn’t include the additional 40+ pages of the Core work (Section

6) which provides a lot more detail than this matrix used to provide.

6. At Industry Day we were made aware of lunar science work. The current Draft RFP does not include lunar science. Are those part of FILMSS 2?

Ans: We have no current requirements for lunar science work however we have the ambition and there is the potential that this may become IDIQ work in the future. Some of the astrobiology instruments and potential biosciences components implementation may be part of FILMSS 2.

7. There was a question on OCI and how this would be evaluated.

Ans: The OCI Mitigation Plan will be evaluated as part of the responsibility determination. Any questions could be addressed during this evaluation without entering into “discussions”

8. In demonstrating creativity and an innovative management approach is it permissible to make suggested changes to the staffing in the price template?

Ans: No, changes to the labor hours in the price template are not allowed.

9. How does the evaluation team approach management and partners?

Ans: The SEB will approach the evaluation of management and partners within the parameters of the evaluation criteria defined in Sections L and M.

10. In para 6.7.2 there is reference for “coordinate refreshments as appropriate”. Isn’t this against the FAR?

Ans: “Coordinating refreshments” means coordinating with service vendors who will provide refreshments and collect payment from attendees.

11. At the end of five years what is your vision for end of contract?

Ans: We don’t have visions for contracts. There is a lot of fluidity right now with the NASA refocus on lunar and the large part of this contract to handle this on the IDIQ part of FILMSS 2.

12. What is the typical lead time for IDIQ?

Ans: Per the CDRL, 10 day turnaround is required for proposal submission, however most upcoming changes and/or any new work requirements are discussed prior to the official task order or task order modification being sent.

13. Do you see some of the IDIQ work ending?

Ans: There have been reductions in Kepler/K2, SOFIA, Rodent Research Program (RRP) and Education this past year. Requirements are always changing which is why a large portion of FILMSS 2 is IDIQ.

14. Are there any other areas where FILMSS 2 pushes the envelope such as the video conferencing?

Ans: Genelab is also at the forefront in it’s field. We are looking for the FILMSS 2 contractor for expertise in communications, web management, video conferencing and other areas in accordance with the L and M requirements.

15. How much are the folks that are supporting FILMSS identifying Commercial Off the Shelf (COTS) systems and how much is developing unique tools?

The software tools are predominantly COTS. See SOW Atch Ja11 which details the Government Furnished Computer Software and whether it is commercial, government developed or open source.

16. Since Industry Day slides won’t be posted on FBO until Wednesday of this week, would you consider extending the questions deadline to next Tuesday?

Ans: Yes, we posted the revised deadline of March 12, 2019 with the slides.

17. What type of science skills on the current work or what type of science skills are you looking to expand to? Do you have any gaps?

Ans: The future requirements are quite fluid, and there is nothing known well enough that would allow us to define the requirements today. We have a core capability in our civil servants. When new requirements are defined we will look to the FILMSS 2 contractor to fill the skills needed including in areas such as bioinformatics, statistics, and omics technologies.

18. There is program management/project management laced throughout FILMSS 2. Is this specifically designated for science? What about Code P?

Ans: The notion is that all FILMSS 2 skill sets are integrated. In the case of the science you may want integration with the project manager. If it’s a standalone independent project management task it probably will not go to FILMSS 2 but be run out of Code P. In SCF we are integrating biology with the hardware. The anticipation is that there will be opportunities for FILMSS 2 to support these types of projects in the future.

19. Would you reconsider the cost proposal submission thresholds for subcontractors to be more in line with other current NASA RFPs (i.e. $3M per year or $15M over 5 years). This requirement is quite a challenge for some of the smaller businesses.

Ans: We will consider changing these in the final RFP.

20. For SSERVI is their equipment COTS?

Ans: We identified what type of software, commercial, government developed and open source on DRFP Atch Ja11 Government Furnished Computer Software.

21. What are the quality documents going to be for FILMSS 2?

Ans: FILMSS 2 won’t be overseeing quality, but they will be expected to follow the quality processes at Ames, as well as coming up with strategies to improve quality as noted in Sections L and M of the DRFP.

22. SLCs are different between Core and IDIQ

Ans: We will relook at this section prior to the Final RFP.

23. What’s the greatest thing you are looking for on FILMSS 2 that you aren’t getting on FILMSS 1?

Ans: Compare the previous RFP Section L to the current RFP Section L to see how our priorities have shifted since the last time.

24. Historically speaking do we have any breakout of the value of the work by code. The current percentage of core by size. For core and IDIQ

Code

FILMSS (1)

Value as % of Core Code

FILMSS (1)

Value as % of IDIQ S 46% S 64% D 30% D 13% A 14% P 10% P 7% T 5% Q 4% J 4% 100% H 2% R 2% 100%

25. Are you looking for a company that does better in management technology or innovation?

Ans: Look at Section L to find the priorities for FILMSS 2, or most critical management and technical criteria. These and the evaluation criteria (riddle) and score weighting show our priorities.

26. When you are looking at innovation in a proposal if there is a lot of risk how would you look at that.

Ans: We have several paragraphs in sec L that address innovation and risk. Make sure these are all addressed.

27. Is current employee retention important to you?

Ans: We don’t have a percentage as a goal. We are looking for a strategy that shows a consistent level of performance from day 1 per Sections L and M of the DRFP.

28. Are there any preferences on team size?

Ans: No

29. We haven’t seen anything about commercial third party work?

Ans: We don’t currently envision that for FILMSS 2.

30. On the Org chart slide, the Tech transfer block is blank.

Ans: Karen Bradford is in charge of both, technology transfer and partnerships.

31. NASA Exchange what do they do?

Ans: Ames is one of three NASA centers that have MWR funds which are shared with the directorates.

Contractors don’t get control of these, though we have many social events, bbq’s or happy hours that on-site contractors may attend. MWR allows this use of non-appropriated funds for employee morale.

32. Laboratory safety addition to the SOW. What prompted that and are there goals?

Ans: We do have a safety and mission assurance organization. Ames recently received its VPP certificate and is working hard to retain this. This desire led us to include more of this specific requirements on some of the core work. This work varies according to the facility. For example, in space biosciences the contractor is creating the safety plan. The contractor leads the safety with oversight from NASA. Each organization does it a little differently, some inspections are done monthly and some quarterly.

33. Do we have a goal for incumbent retention?

Ans: In Sec L in Management approach we a strategy to insure there will be no significant drop off in performance from Day 1.

34. One of the FILMSS 2 requirements includes the ability to bring in foreign nationals. However ITAR control is not discussed.

Ans: We have an export controls branch that is part of Center Ops. Each new project has to go through the ITAR process.

35. Do you have an idea of how far people are commuting?

Ans: Many people including the people in this room live 13-35 miles away (some even commute further and rent a local room for the week). Work hours can be shifted to help avoid traffic. Additionally there is a lot of public transportation that can aid people in reducing the stress of the commute: Caltrain, Ace Train, BART, with Light Rail and bus shuttles that connect directly to Moffett Field.

36. Is there something you can share regarding Ames involvement in Gateway?

Ans: Ames is quite optimistic that our expertise in lunar work, including LCross, Lunar resource prospector would lead to us having a significant role. It’s currently not clear what exactly that would be.

We want to make sure we have a contract in place to allow us perform this type of work within IDIQ.

37. In the outreach collaboration particularly in Code AT what are the key challenges that we could help you with.

Ans: Employee retention is key across all work here. Bottom line is we will rate what we have included in section L and M of the RFP.

38. What is the current number of WYE’s on FILMSS?

Ans: 200-275

39. Will FILMSS 2 be impacted by the Mission Support Future Architecture Program (MAP)?

Ans: Public affairs is currently going through MAP review. It may be a candidate for consolidation with other NASA centers in the future.

40. How does the Logistics on FILMSS 2 differ from that provided by the Logistic Management Services (LMS) contract?

Ans: Centerwide non-unique services are done by LMS.

41. We understand that oral presentations should be done by key personnel. Would you consider allowing one additional non-key member to attend so that they can observe without involvement and be in a position to provide a lessons learned for the contractor for the future?

Ans: We will consider this request and make this update in the final RFP if granted.

42. We noted yesterday that major areas of FILMSS 2 appear to be science, communications, and collaboration. We did not see program management or systems engineering as a large focus.

Ans: Project management is more integrated within each core element/task order. Often the Project manager will be a civil servant and the contractor will be tasked for different elements, depending on the task.

43. Is running the labs part of FILMSS 2?

Ans: Yes it can be, including resupply and calibration. For Genelab there is a wetlab that is included in the support requirements in the SOW. For IDIQ these are not spelled out at this time.

44. Several questions were asked about Grants –

Ans: The technical monitor is always a civil servant. On space bio there is a FILMSS grants manager and an assistant that manages all 60 active grants. They handle disbursement and coordinate, all the reporting and work with NSSC. Sometimes FILMSS contractors assist in writing, reviewing or working on grant proposals.

45. Can FILMSS work be accomplished remotely?

Ans: There are instances where remote work may be appropriate, however most FILMSS work is accomplished on-site.

46. Is there a charge for NASA office space for FILMSS 2 employees?

Ans: The government provides the office space, computers and phones for FILMSS (1 and 2) employees free of charge.

47. There appears to be a lack of CIO involvement in the choice of tools.

Ans: The CIO has oversight in this realm. The contractor must follow the rules to procure IT equipment.

Any COTS purchase that would be made must be integrated in the CIO plan. Any new software license must be in NASA’s name.

48. Latest in technology – what else are you looking for staying on the edge and being aware of what’s coming down the road?

Ans: We have identified what is critical to FILMSS in Section L and M which describes what will be evaluated.

49. What is the difference between NAMS vs ISRDS vs FILMSS?

What makes FILMSS unique is the combination of these skill sets: science, project management, virtual

50. Will IDIQ exceed the Core?

Ans: Yes, as with the current FILMSS, we anticipate that IDIQ will exceed the Core.

51. What kind of incumbent retention do you expect?

Ans: There is no specific number for incumbent capture. Section L requires Offerors to provide a strategic approach to how requirements will be met from day one considering the unique challenges in Silicon Valley.

52. What were the ramifications of the shutdown?

Ans: We are gathering lessons learned and what to do more smartly in the future.

53. Has any consideration been given to fixed price task orders?

Ans: We considered these when developing our acquisition strategy but determined that given the changing R&D environment, CPFF made the most sense.

54. Case study question – effect of radiation on organism in deep space. Does this exclude going around the moon?

Ans: It’s a hypothetical case study you need to decide how best to answer. There is no right answer. We will evaluate the response in accordance with Sections L and M of the DRFP.

55. Regarding model organism how do you mitigate the public perception of putting mice to sleep.

Ans: In real life the Government would provide guidance but for this hypothetical case study you’re on your own within the page limit constraints.

56. What is the labor mix on the existing program?

The labor mix of the Core is in line with the Pricing template.

57. What do you see changing from FILMSS 1 to FILMSS 2?

In FILMSS 2 we tried to identify more of the Core and more of the deliverables. The nature of work and skillsets are very similar.

58. Key personnel – was there a limit to the number?

Ans: No, however there is a limit of 5 that can attend the Oral presentation.

59. Do you expect a regional accommodation for salary?

Ans: We expect to pay the local rates for salary.

60. A lot of mention on SME?

Ans: The SME is mainly for IDIQ for temporary support of large events, conferences, proposal submissions; a vehicle to bring them on board for a finite period of time. We can’t predict the length of time as this may vary. Surge capability needs to be able to be provided.

61. Do you have any particular concerns?

Ans: It is critical that you focus your proposal on sections L and M and not what was discussed during Industry Day.

62. There was discussion of the rodent habitats, can you comment on these?

Ans: Sustaining the rodent habitats is currently part of an IDIQ task order. We are building new units, we will continue to maintain the fleet of habitats and transporters. Any updates to the hardware will be done with an IDIQ task order.

63. Can you explain the grants mentioned in the Industry Day?

Ans: The Space biology project awards scientific grants to universities, and other entities sometimes even contractor staff. Civil servants are the technical monitors. FILMSS 2 supports this effort with grant administration, to include disbursement of funds, reporting of funding used. FILMSS may also be used review, write and evaluate proposals.

64. What is the legal authority for the grants?

Ans: 2 C.F.R. 200 and the NASA supplement 2 C.F.R. 1800. Here is the link:

https://prod.nais.nasa.gov/pub/pub_library/srba/index.html