9531BM21Q0011A0001 - IT Research Subscription.pdf

AMENDMENT CONTROL NUMBER :

SUMMARY OF CHANGES :

9531BM21Q0011A0001

07/07/2021

Sections B - M, Page 1 of 10

SECTION B – SUPPLIES OR SERVICES AND PRICES

1. Supplies/Services Contractor shall provide a subscription-based electronic resource to support the development of the NTSB’s future technical direction. The subscription shall include up to four (4) seats, with one reserved for an executive CIO.

2. Schedule of Supplies/Services The anticipated dates of performance are as follows:

(Actual dates to be entered upon establishment of contract. For pricing purposes, offerors may assume August 1, 2021 for task order start date.)

Item Number

Description Period of Performance

Quanti ty

Unit

0001 Base Year – IT Research Subscription

8/1/2021 – 7/31/2022 1 LOT

0002 Option Year 1 – IT Research Subscription

8/1/2022 – 7/31/2023 1 LOT

0003 Option Year 2 - IT Research Subscription

8/1/2023 – 7/31/2024 1 LOT

0004 Option Year 3 - IT Research Subscription

8/1/2024 – 7/31/2025 1 LOT

0005 Option Year 4 - IT Research Subscription

8/1/2025 – 7/31/2026 1 LOT

The total possible period of performance for the resulting task order(s) shall not exceed five (5) years.

3. Prices of Supplies/Services The NTSB anticipates awarding at least one fixed-price task order off a vendor’s FEDLINK electronic resources IDIQ contract. The NTSB reserves the right to make multiple awards if it is determined to be in the Government’s best interest. The contractor shall provide the NTSB with a subscription to an electronic resource in accordance with Section C – Statement of Work.

Offerors shall provide fixed prices based on their FEDLINK IDIQ pricing for each ordering period.

Additional instructions are provided in Section L – Instructions to Offerors.

4. Obligation of Funds

Funds will be obligated in the fiscal year in which the supplies/services are provided.

[END OF SECTION]

Sections B - M, Page 2 of 10

SECTION C – STATEMENT OF WORK

1. BACKGROUND

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is an independent federal agency responsible for determining the probable cause of transportation accidents and issuing safety recommendations aimed at preventing future accidents, conducting transportation safety research, promoting transportation safety, and assisting victims of transportation accidents and their families. Part of this responsibility includes investigating all aviation accidents that occur in the United States as well as major accidents over highway, marine, railroad, pipeline, and hazard materials transportation accidents. The NTSB is responsible for maintaining the government's data base on civil aviation accidents and conducts special studies of transportation safety issues of national significance. The NTSB provides investigators to serve as U.S. Accredited Representatives as specified in international treaties for aviation accidents overseas involving U.S.-registered aircraft or involving aircraft or major components of U.S.

manufacture.

2. OBJECTIVE

In support of this mission, the NTSBs Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) is seeking a subscription-based service from a leading technology research firm to support the development of the NTSB’s future technical direction in the following areas:

• Technology Roadmap in support of the new NTSB Strategic Plan

• Data maturity assessment to meet federal Evidence Act requirements in support of the

Chief Data Scientist

• Human Capital Plan with peer organization benchmarking

• Improve federal FISMA (information security) requirements

• Assess emerging technologies to inform future acquisitions

3. SCOPE OF WORK

The required electronic resource shall include up to four (4) subscriptions, with one reserved for an executive CIO.

The electronic resource shall:

• Offer a program that is completely objective. No research shall be sponsored, regardless if it is included in the research database or not, which could potentially compromise independent objectives

• Provide unlimited access to dedicated, full-time IT subject matter experts solely for Research activities.

• Provide access to an IT Research database, toolkits and metrics that are timely and relevant to the staff. Metrics must have been collected from many sources. Vendor shall specify details surrounding the data collection including geography, number of responses and amount of IT spend represented.

• Provide talent management tools and guides structured through demographic datasets surrounding the current knowledge workers available, the location of talent, other organizations hiring, education levels, skills and more.

Sections B - M, Page 3 of 10

• Provide access to research on critical topics where business and IT intersect, including corporate strategic planning, risk response strategies, change communications, finance technology optimization, and planning, budgeting, and forecasting.

The executive CIO subscription shall:

• Provide access to additional insight delivered through an aligned CIO Advisor who has deep CIO experience

• Provide an authoritative data and IT benchmarking database to support staffing and investment levels as well as key technology cost and performance metrics.

• Provides CIOs and senior IT executives trusted insights, strategic advice, and practical solutions with an added focus on actionable research

• Provide CIOs and senior IT executives research including practical tools and templates and best practice case studies; and additional analysts to contextualize research. Also, provide access to resources to define strategy and make the right decisions fast — with a new focus on translating vision into an actionable plan

• Provide tools that are guides to building and monitoring important projects that are structured to plan projects, build solutions, and monitor the project’s outcomes

• Provide invitations to a CIO-focused events, Public sector sessions and CIO peer networking opportunities.

4. DELIVERABLES

The contractor will deliver the following, in accordance with Section 3, above:

• A dedicated Executive Partner who will regularly meet with the government lead to identify, define, develop, and prioritize specific opportunities and challenges, as well as provide insights and recommendations in the context of the executive’s organization.

• Complete Data maturity assessment to meet federal Evidence Act requirements in support of the Chief Data Scientist

• Unlimited access to exclusive CIO content, role-specific research, and tools

• Unlimited access to technology content, including peer benchmarks, best practices, case studies, tools, and templates

• Research shall be 100% original created by vendor’s dedicated team of Research analysts

• Access to a comprehensive industry leading IT research library

• Access to non-IT key initiatives across multiple business domains, including corporate strategic planning, enterprise risk response strategies, change communications, finance technology optimization, and planning, budgeting, and forecasting

• Access to peer-driven research including practical tools and templates, and best practice case studies.

• Access to IT benchmarking database to plan the IT budget with relevant facts and metrics to justify IT spending and staffing costs, identify opportunities for cost optimization and investment prioritization and provide services at fair-market prices and service levels

• A dedicated team of government analysts, including analysts dedicated to writing and contextualizing research specifically for Federal clients

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5. PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE

The total estimated period of performance is a base year and four (4) 12-month option years, for a total period of performance of up to five (5) years.

6. SECTION 508

Vendor shall support the government’s obligation to provide accessible technologies to its citizens with disabilities as required by Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1974, and its state law counterparts.

7. CONTRACT ADMINISTRATION

Contracting Officer’s Representative (COR):

TBD

Contracting Officer:

Peter M. Hazlinsky

(202) 314-5209 Matt.hazlinsky@ntsb.gov

Contract Specialist:

Kate Campbell

(202) 314-6209 Kate.campbell@ntsb.gov

Sections B - M, Page 5 of 10

SECTION J – LIST OF ATTACHMENTS

1. Past Performance Questionnaire

Sections B - M, Page 6 of 10

SECTION L – INSTRUCTIONS TO OFFERORS

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) solicits your quote for a subscription-based service to support the Office of the Chief Information Officer in accordance with Section C – Statement of Work of the Request for Quote (RFQ).

The NTSB anticipates awarding at least one fixed-price task order off a vendor’s FEDLINK electronic resources IDIQ contract. The NTSB reserves the right to make multiple awards if it is determined to be in the Government’s best interest. The number of seats on each award may vary; therefore, each award may not be for a total of four (4) seats. Four is the total number of seats that the NTSB expects to order.

Offerors must be found to be responsible in order to be eligible for award.

Solicitation Question and Answer Instructions Written questions concerning this solicitation must be submitted by 4:00pm Eastern time on Wednesday, June 30, 2021 via e-mail to Kate Campbell, Contract Specialist, at kate.campbell@ntsb.gov. Answers to all questions will be provided through an amendment to the RFQ.

Electronic Dissemination of Documents Access to this RFQ and amendments will be posted to the Contract Opportunities page at beta.sam.gov. All offerors are cautioned that it is your responsibility to frequently check back to the website to ensure that you have received all issued amendments.

Submission of Quotes Quotes must be submitted and received via e-mail to kate.campbell@ntsb.gov by the time and date specified in Block 10 of the SF18. Close of business is considered 5pm Eastern Time.

Quotes shall be submitted in Adobe PDF format.

LATE OFFERS WILL NOT BE CONSIDERED. Offers submitted with inadequate information may be found unacceptable.

The maximum email file size that the NTSB e-mail server can accept, including attachments, is 35 megabytes (MB). Offerors may segregate offers and submit in separate e-mails if the combined file size of the offer will exceed 35MB. Offerors are encouraged to remove excess graphics from their offers to ensure offers remain under the file size limit.

As a reminder, it is the offeror’s responsibility to confirm the Government has received their offer prior to the offer submission deadline.

The successful Offeror must be registered in the System for Award Management (www.sam.gov) at the time of award.

Instructions for Preparation of Quotes mailto:kate.campbell@ntsb.gov http://www.sam.gov/

Sections B - M, Page 7 of 10

Quote Organization Offerors shall respond to all requirements of this solicitation. Offers submitted with inadequate information may be found unacceptable. For this solicitation, offerors shall submit quotes in two

(2) separate volumes as follows:

(1) Volume I -Technical Section: Include all information requested under paragraph “Volume

I: Technical Section.” Exclude any references to price in the Technical Section.

(2) Volume II - Business Section: Include all information requested under paragraph “Volume II: Business Section”.

Requirements for Quote Content Include the following for both Volumes:

(1) Cover sheet containing the offeror's name, address, phone number, FEDLINK contract number, e-mail, website address, title of offeror's quote, Solicitation Number, and quote Volume Number.

(2) "Table of Contents" which provides enough detail to quickly locate key elements of the offer.

Volume I: Technical Section Include all information required for evaluation. Exclude references to price. The offeror is responsible for including details to permit a complete and accurate evaluation of the quote strictly from a technical standpoint.

Technical Volume Content

The offeror shall provide the following information in response to the solicitation in the format specified below:

Evaluation Factor 1 – Executive Summary (Not Separately Evaluated)

An Executive Summary of the Offeror’s quote is required. This summary will not be evaluated but will be used to gain an understanding of the Contractor and the overall quote contents.

Therefore, the information contained in the executive summary is important. It should identify and highlight significant features of the quote and include the salient points contained in the various parts. Each offeror shall include a General Information section in the Executive Summary that addresses the following: 1) company name and address; 2) Company Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), Dun and Bradstreet’s number (DUNS), CAGE code; and 3) FEDLINK contract number.

Evaluation Factor 2 – Objective Guidance Offerors shall provide documentation that demonstrates that their provided research is non-biased, independent, and objective. The NTSB desires objectivity in research to enable impartial due diligence and aid in decision making. The vendor should provide a reasonable expectation that the design, conduct, and reporting of research will be free from bias. Often bias results from conflicts of interest and sponsorship of research, among other things. Objective research may be

Sections B - M, Page 8 of 10 described as value-free (i.e., as research that is unaffected by moral, economic, social, political, or religious values), reliable or trustworthy (like a thermometer that reliably reports the temperature), and finally factual or real.

Evaluation Factor 3 – Volume/Scope of Research and Benchmarking Data Offerors shall describe the number of research documents (excluding miscellaneous items such as social media, blogs, and images/charts/figures) published in each of the past three years (calendar years 2018, 2019, and 2020). The research documents shall be categorized to demonstrate the volume and scope of research coverage. Benchmarking data shall be provided, including government-specific benchmarking.

Evaluation Factor 4 – IT Executive Subscription The contractor shall provide level and type of content included in this executive subscription including access to an executive advisor, best practices, peer to peer communities, CIO forums, etc. Offerors shall provide resumes of a minimum of three (3) aligned CIO Advisors who currently partner with other Federal clients. The resumes shall describe their experience, educational background, any relevant certifications, and significant accomplishments in the Information Technology industry.

Volume II: Business Section

Evaluation Factor 5 – Past Performance Offerors shall provide information on a minimum of three (3) and maximum of five (5) references for Federal government contracts completed no more than three (3) years ago that demonstrates performance similar to the NTSB’s requirement in size, scope, and complexity. Include a short description of each example of Past Performance, the contract type, contract number, period(s) of performance, the name of the client, and the address and contact information (name, telephone number, email address) for each reference.

Offerors shall ask their references provided under Factor 5 - Past Performance, to complete the Past Performance Questionnaire (Attachment 1) and submit it directly to Kate Campbell via email at kate.campbell@ntsb.gov, or fax: (240) 752-6322. It is the offeror’s responsibility to ensure that Past Performance Questionnaires are completed and timely submitted by customer references, and that correct names, addresses and phone numbers are provided in the responses for each reference. An offeror will not be penalized in the evaluation with an unfavorable rating for the failure of its references to complete and submit the Past Performance Questionnaires.

Evaluation Factor 6 – Price Offerors shall provide fixed prices based on their FEDLINK IDIQ pricing (discounts encouraged) per Ordering Period for the non-Executive and Executive Subscriptions. Each seat shall be priced independently, as the NTSB reserves the right to make multiple task order awards. Each award may not be for a total of four (4) seats.

For each Contract Line Item (CLIN), Offerors shall provide a total price for three (3) non-executive subscriptions and one (1) IT executive subscription. Offerors shall also provide a price breakout for each CLIN that reflects the unit price of each subscription type.

mailto:kate.campbell@ntsb.gov

Sections B - M, Page 9 of 10

SECTION M – EVALUATION FACTORS FOR AWARD

Basis for Award NTSB will use comparative evaluation to compare offers to each other to select the contractor or contractors that is best suited and provides the best value, considering the evaluation factors in the solicitation. When using comparative evaluation, ratings are not assigned; rather, the evaluators document the observations of each Offeror’s technical quote for each evaluation factor.

The Government reserves the right to reject any or all quotes if such action is in the public interest.

Under a best value procurement, the NTSB may reasonably determine that the superior technical capability merits a higher price and, therefore, represents the best value to the Government or the NTSB may reasonably determine that the Offeror with other than the highest rating in non-price/cost factors is the best value. The Government may waive informalities and minor irregularities in quotes. The Government reserves the right to award without discussions. Offerors are cautioned that they must submit a best offer with the initial quote. To receive an award, an Offeror must be determined to be responsible.

Responsibility Determination

In order to be eligible for award, the Contracting Officer must determine that the offeror is responsible according to the standards of FAR 9.1, "Responsible Prospective Contractors".

Evaluation Process

The following factors will be evaluated by the Government:

QUOTE PART # FACTORS and

SUBFACTORS

TITLE

I Technical Quote 2 Objective Guidance 3 Volume/Scope of Research and

Benchmarking Data 4 IT Executive Subscription II Business Quote 5 Past Performance 6 Price

The non-price factors in Part I will be evaluated to determine strengths and weaknesses.

Technical Factors 2 and 3 are equally important, and are more important than Technical Factor

4. When combined, the technical factors are more important than price. However, as quotes become more equal in non-price factors, price becomes more important. The Government reserves the right to reject any or all quotes if such action is in the public interest.

Past Performance will be evaluated and will be rated Acceptable or Unacceptable. The Government will assess the relevance, breadth and quality of the Contractor’s recent past performance with clients who have purchased similar services and evaluate the quality of the Contractor’s past performance based on the past performance references submitted on behalf of the Contractor and/or other information obtained from references provided by the Contractor, as

Sections B - M, Page 10 of 10 well as other relevant past performance information obtained from other sources known to the Government. A Contractor without a record of past performance or for whom information on relevant past performance is not available will be evaluated as neutral. Contractors are cautioned that despite the relative weight of the non-price factors, proposals that receive an unacceptable in Part II may be deemed ineligible for award.

Price is not rated adjectively. Price will be evaluated but not scored. Pricing will be evaluated to determine whether the proposed pricing is realistic for the electronic resource being purchased, that it reflects a clear understanding of the requirements, and is consistent with the approach described in the Contractor’s technical quote.

As part of its price evaluation, the Government specifically reserves the right to evaluate the risk associated with any pricing schemes. Price quotes will be evaluated to determine the reasonableness of a Contractor’s quote. Evaluation may include analysis to determine a Contractor’s comprehension of the solicitation requirements, as well as the validity of a Contractor’s approach.

A price that is found to be unreasonably high or unrealistically low in relation to the proposed upgrade requirement may result in the quote receiving a lower rating or a Contractor’s quote may be rejected if the pricing poses an unacceptable risk to the Government.

ATTACHMENT 1

PAST PERFORMANCE QUESTIONNAIRE

National Transportation Safety Board

Offeror’s Name: ___________________________________________ Solicitation: 9531BM20Q0011 Person/Point of Contact: ___________________________ Telephone: _______________________ E-Mail:____________________________ Facsimile: ________________________ Title and Organization:

Instructions: Offerors are to forward to references listed under responses to the Past Performance portion of the Technical Proposal. References should submit completed questionnaires via fax to Kate Campbell at (240) 752-6322. Any questions regarding this questionnaire may be sent to Kate.Campbell@ntsb.gov.

1. Type of Service. What type of services did the contractor perform for your agency?

2. Quality of Performance. Did the contractor perform in a manner that conformed to contract requirements and demonstrated standards of good workmanship? Please explain.

3. Timeliness of Performance. Did the contractor adhere to the contract schedule?

4. Customer Satisfaction. Did the contractor demonstrate reasonable and cooperative behavior and commitment to customer satisfaction? Did the contractor display a business-like concern for the interest of the customer? Was the customer ultimately satisfied?

5. Based on the contractor’s overall performance, would you award them another contract?

[ ] YES [ ] NO Please explain.

Access to this RFQ and amendments will be posted to the Contract Opportunities page at beta.sam.gov. All offerors are cautioned that it is your responsibility to frequently check back to the website to ensure that you have received all issued amendments.

Attachment 1 - Past Performance Questionnaire