A02.06 JA GeoWATCH_Redacted.pdf

ERDC Control Number: 24-3037

Justification Review Document for Other than Full and Open Competition - FAR Part 6

Requirement: U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC), Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory (CHL) has a requirement to provide software enhancements and integrate updated algorithms and/or functionality into Geospatial Weather Affected Terrain and Conditions (GeoWATCH) tool and support the transition of the GeoWATCH software package to Government information systems.

Authority: 10 United States Code, 2304(c)(5) as implemented in FAR 6.302-5(a)(2)(i), statute expressly authorizes or requires that the acquisition be made through another agency or from a specified source.

Period of Performance: Sixty months which includes a twelve-month base period and four -twelve-month option periods.

Estimated Amount: $10,663,404.69

Contracting Officer:

Christine Wilson Phone: (217) 552-5258 Procuring Contracting Officer Email: Christine.L.Wilson@usace.army.mil

Center Reviews

Reviews: I have reviewed this justification and found it adequate to support other than full and open competition.

SCO-ALX and Headquarters Reviews

I have reviewed this justification and find it adequate to support other than full and open competition.

Justification For Other Than Full and Open Competition

1. Contracting Activity: The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Engineer

Research and Development Center (ERDC) Contracting Office located at 3909 Halls Ferry Road, Vicksburg, MS 39180-6199.

2. Description of Action: The Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory (CHL) is seeking approval to award a Firm-Fixed-Price sole-source indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) Single Award Task Order Contract (SATOC) to Creare, LLC (Creare) for software services to support, integrate, and transition the GeoWATCH tool with an estimated value of $10,663,404.69. This contract will be carried out by the means of performance-based, firm of the contract will be sixty months which includes a twelve month base period and four twelve month option periods from the date of award. The minimum guarantee of $2,500.00 will be funded with Research Development, Test & Evaluation, Army (R&D), 2040 type funds. Funds to be used for task orders will be identified at the task order level but may come from Department of Defense (DoD) sponsors specifically the U.S. Air Force (USAF) Technical Applications Center, and potentially other USAF and/or U.S. Army organizations.

In some instances, the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, and U.S. Navy may provide R&D funding to assist with the further development of integration, transition, and growing technical requirements of GeoWATCH.

3. Description of Services: This requirement is an SBIR/STTR Phase III award that is derived from and extends efforts made under prior SBIR/STTR Funding Agreements and is authorized pursuant to 15 U.S.C. 638(r)(4). It is for a software services contract with the primary goal of providing software enhancements and integrate updated algorithms and functionality into GeoWATCH and supports the transition of the GeoWATCH software package to Government information systems. The new contract is needed to continue enhancing the GeoWATCH capability to provide enhanced tailoring of application output to more directly support end-user needs, including enhancements to weather/climate impacts on mobility during winter and spring seasons, and to increase the capability of the software to support longer-range climate scenarios versus the existing 10-year weather archive.

Numerous end-users, including Staff Weather Officers, Engineer Officers, and officers within other DOD agencies, have requested these enhancements and are interested in sponsoring enhancements to the GeoWATCH software and are also interested in working with ERDC to receive a distribution of the software and receiving support to integrate/implement the software on their Government information systems to operate the software and produce results supporting their operations. These organizations including the USAF Weather, the program of record for all Army/USAF weather operations, as well as other DOD agencies within the national intelligence community. This contract will also provide a period of support to make sure the software is installed correctly and operating as expected. Table 1 below depicts the estimated annual value for the base period and options for the life of the anticipated SATOC.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and others have published journal papers outlining a soil moisture downscaling approach that works primarily off satellite-based input at much coarser resolutions than GeoWATCH, limiting the applicability of those products to support off-road, ground vehicle mobility modeling, while GeoWATCH was specifically developed to meet resolution specifications to support off-road, ground vehicle mobility modeling. Further, none of those products have demonstrated the ability to compute real-time downscaled soil moisture, soil strength and ground vehicle mobility estimates that the integrated GeoWATCH application can produce.

The GeoWATCH software is unique in that it singularly has the ability to acquire and use authoritative soil moisture products from the USAF 557th Weather Wing, increase the resolution of those products from 25 kilometers (km) spatially to 30-meter (or finer in some cases) spatially for all global land areas, and links in ERDC developed soil strength and cross-country mobility models. This specific type of integrated software and geospatial product technology has not been replicated by any other commercial provider via a real-time, globally demonstratable system.

b. Justification:

i. The GeoWATCH capability was developed under SBIR Phase I, Phase II and Phase

III contracts, and therefore Small Business Innovative Research SBIR data rights apply.

ii. This contract represents a Phase III project, and therefore according to the SBIR program the Government has the right to sole-source with Creare, LLC for the work with no dollar limit based on the SBIR Reauthorization Act (15 U.S.C. 638) as well as the SBA SBIR/STTR Policy Directive.

iii. The Government maintains no restrictions to use of the developed code, although

Creare maintains SBIR data rights.

15 U.S.C. 638(r)(4) states: To the greatest extent practicable, Federal agencies and Federal prime contractors shall (A) consider an award under the SBIR program or the STTR program to satisfy the requirements under section 3201 through 3205 of title 10 and any other applicable competition requirements; and (B) issue, without further justification, Phase III awards relating to technology, including sole source awards, to the SBIR and STTR award recipients that developed the technology.

dated 3 May 2023, Paragraph 4(c)(3), Competition Requirement: The competitions for SBIR/STTR Phase I and Phase II awards satisfy any competition requirement of the Armed Services Procurement Act, the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act, and the Competition in Contracting Act. An agency that wishes to fund a SBIR/STTR Phase III award, which is an extension of prior Phase I and/or Phase II awards, is not required to conduct another competition for the Phase III award to satisfy those statutory provisions. As a result, in conducting actions relative to a Phase III SBIR/STTR award, it is sufficient to state for purposes of a Justification and Approval, if one is deemed required by the agency, that the project is an SBIR/STTR Phase III award that is derived from, extends, or completes efforts made under prior SBIR/STTR Funding Agreements and is authorized pursuant to 15 U.S.C. 638(r)(4). Further justification is not needed.

c. Alternatives: There are no comparable real-time, weather-integrated, globally applicable soil moisture downscaling applications available from other sources. ERDC-CHL is aware of other soil moisture downscaling algorithms within the broader scientific literature. ERDC-CHL has also collaborated with university researchers and has been party to briefings conducted by other companies talking about early research into soil moisture downscaling and/or machine-learning based high resolution soil moisture product technologies; however, the GeoWATCH software is currently significantly more advanced from a software development perspective than any competitor.

Based upon market research feedback obtained as detailed in Section 8 below, other geospatial companies do not have this capability. See further comments in Section 8.

d. Impact: The proposed contract action associated with this requirement adds user based/sourced needs to the tool to better inform operators and transitions the software system into DOD information systems serving as official programs of record. This contract action supports tactical maneuvers in a tight mission space that allows the users advanced knowledge of conditions over time. Without the progression/prioritization of this contract action the overall product being delivered to the user base will be delayed to the point of degradation of information to our trusted services and intelligence communities, as data developed is utilized by the intelligence community in critical decision making. The data utilized in this contract is constantly updated. The current product is ten years in development. This potentially impending delay will jeopardize a long standing multi-million-dollar relationship for the ERDC by not being able to meet timelines as needed from the end users in the intelligence, Army, and other DOD communities.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted from 3 January 2024 to 5 March 2024 and did not result in the identification of additional sources for these software service requirements.

a. Effective Competition: A Notice of Intent (NOI) to award this requirement on a sole-source basis to Creare was posted to the Governmentwide point of entry (GPE), SAM.GOV website on 7 February 2024 through 14 February 2024 under NAICS 541715 Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences (except Nanotechnology and Biotechnology) with a Small Business Size Standard of 1,000 employees. All interested responsible sources were informed that they could submit a capability statement including their experience and past performance, a proposal, or a quotation demonstrating their ability to provide the requirement for consideration by the Procuring Contracting Officer. No vendor responses were received.

b. Subcontracting Competition: Creare is a Small Business. As a Small Business, Creare is exempted from providing a subcontracting plan in accordance with FAR 52.219-9(a), Small Business Subcontracting Plan.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: Based on information in paragraphs 5 and 6, above, competition for this action is not feasible and would not be cost effective to the Government.

Further, the Government is prohibited within the SBIR Policy Directive from releasing any of the GeoWATCH capability. As such, this action falls into the category of cases wherein it is not possible to compete the acquisition due to the nature of the requirement.

8. Market Research: Market research was conducted from 3 January 2024 to 5 March 2024 using the following methods.

a. Internet searches, one-on-one contacts in the industry at professional conferences, including the American Meteorological Society annual meetings over the past ten years held in January/February at rotating locations, or the American Geophysical Union fall meeting held in December very year at large convention centers, recently in San Francisco, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., and through personal communications as well as discussions with other Federal agencies who contract for GUI development for their numerical models. Further, the other commercial entities developing soil moisture-impacts capabilities were not focused on integrating Army algorithms for soil strength and ground vehicle mobility models, a critical gap that is a key component of the GeoWATCH applications.

Competent software engineering companies and research universities exist that could possibly re-create what currently exists in GeoWATCH. Some of those entities could include: (1) NextGen Federal who previously had a USAF Phase-II SBIR titled: Soil Moisture Advancements from Research to Transition (SMART) under Contract FA9453- 19-C-0718; Colorado State University researchers who have published numerous uilibrium Moisture from Topography, Vegetation, and Soil (EMT+VS) . However, the academic institutions that have developed the downscaling technologies lack a strong commercial partner to integrate the soil moisture downscaling algorithms with the authoritative weather data from the USAF 557 WW, and ERDC soil strength and mobility applications into a real-time, web-based, global geospatial product display system. We have engaged directly with the CSU principal investigator on the EMT+VS topic, has listed in to technical research reviews they have conducted for their research sponsors and they have expressed interest in providing knowledge to ERDC for integration into GeoWATCH, but do not have a commercial partnership and/or knowledge to develop the software capability similar to the GeoWATCH application. Further, we have engaged with academic researchers at the University of Virginia to inquire about their capabilities. The university has published numerous papers on downscaling soil moisture products but the highest resolution they rs and far coarser than the capabilities of GeoWATCH and not able to support the real-time product generation capabilities

GeoWATCH is able to support.

b. As described in paragraph 6 above, a NOI was issued on the GPE but did not result in any responses.

c. Conclusion: Based upon the foregoing market research, the fact that the GeoWATCH capability was developed under SBIR Phase I and Phase II contracts, and the applicability of Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Program data rights, this contract will be pursued as a Phase III project on a sole source basis with Creare.

9. Interested Sources:

Creare, LLC

UEI JDKYAKDT4TT6

10. Other Facts:

Procurement Background:

a. Table 2 below depicts the historical contracts related to the GeoWatch software development, etc.

Table 2: Contract Award History

i. The initial SBIR Phase I contract number was W913E5-13-C-0005, competitively awarded as a Firm-Fixed Price contract on 23 January 2013 at a total value of $149,940.00 for a six-month period of performance. The Base CLIN 0001 was executed with a value of $99,997.00. Option CLIN 0002 was not exercised.

Phase I was issued pursuant to the Small Business Research and Development Enhancement Act of 2000, as authorized by PL 106-554, DoD SBIR/STTR/CPP programs extended via 2012 National Defense Authorization Act through September 2012. Phase I of this requirement was solicited via the DoD SBIR Program, Fiscal Year 2012.2, Topic Number A12-

-094-0433, -Based, High Resolution Soil Strength Pre

Contract Number Contracting Activity Amount of Award Period of Performance W913E5-13-C-0005 (SBIR Phase 1)

ERDC-CRREL $149,940.00 23 January 2013-26 July

W913E5-14-C-0002 (SBIR Phase 2)

ERDC-CRREL $1,619,274.92 23 February 2014-22 February 2017

W912HZ21C0009

(SBIR Phase 3)

ERDC-CHL $249,934.29 29 January 2021-28 January 2022

W912HZ23D0001

(SBIR Phase 3)

ERDC-CHL $2,500,000.00 07 November 2023-15 December 2027 found at https://www.sbir.gov/node/372840. The scope of this contract included initial development of algorithms to be provided to the Army with accurate, high-resolution estimates of near-surface soil moisture and associated soil strength allowing for improved situational awareness of the battlespace, enhanced mobility predictions, ground-based target acquisition and identification, and flood mapping.

Secondary benefits included improved knowledge of high-resolution soil moisture improving agricultural industry estimates.

ii. The SBIR Phase-II contract number was W913E5-14-C-0002, awarded as a Firm-

Fixed Price contract on 20 March 2014 at a value of $999,311.11 for a twenty-four-month period of performance. On 7 March 2016, P00003 was issued for an in-scope modification in the amount of $499,965.14, increasing the total contract value to $1,499,276.25. On 31 May 2017, P00006 was issued for an in-scope modification in the amount of $119,998.67, increasing the total contract value to $1,619,274.92.

Award of Phase II included continuation of the project upon successful completion of Phase I. Scope of Phase II included building on the results from Phase I by enhancing fidelity of its physics-based soil moisture downscaling models, implementing algorithms for data upscaling, validating, and demonstrating the accuracy of its Data Assimilation for Soil Strength Prediction (DASSP) model, extending the DASSP software for improved usability, functionality, and integration with relevant Army systems, and delivering the final DASSP software and documentation to the Army.

iii. SBIR Phase III contract award number was W912HZ21C0009 and was awarded as a

Cost-Plus Fixed Fee (CPFF) contract on 29 January 2021 at a value of $249,934.29 for a twelve-month period of performance. Award of the initial Phase III included continuation of the project upon successful completion of Phase II.

Scope of the initial Phase III award included modification of the GeoWATCH server to use Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 as the operating system (RHEL-7), update GeoWATCH dependencies to use versions supported by RHEL-7, deliver the baseline GeoWATCH source code and server configuration as a VirtualBox virtual machine to the US Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC), update the baseline GeoWATCH application programming interface application programming interface (API) for performing server-side processing and generating user-defined products (UDP) on the GeoWATCH server, and deliver the updated GeoWATCH source code with UDP capability to the AFTAC.

iv. SBIR Phase III Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) Single Award Task

Order Contract (SATOC) contract number W912HZ23D0001 was awarded 16 December 2022 at a value of $2,500,000.00 for a five-year period of performance.

The scope of the IDIQ included software services with the primary goal of supporting the upgrade and technical transition of the GeoWATCH software, developed previously under a USACE Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) program, into a Government information system. The contractor was required to prepare the software for transition, perform software enhancements required to satisfy software security concerns based on ERDC and/or United States Air Force (USAF) software security scans, and transition the GeoWATCH software into a Government information system. The requirement also included a period of support to make sure the software was installed correctly and operating as expected. The growth among the the exhausted.

b. Competitive Status: Not available for competition. As indicated in paragraph 5.b. above, Federal prime contractors shall (A) consider an award under the SBIR program or the STTR program to satisfy the requirements under section 3201 through 3205 of title 10 and any other applicable competition requirements; and (B) issue, without further justification, Phase III awards relating to technology, including sole source awards, to the

c. Previous Authority Cited: 10 United States Code, Section 2304(c)(5) as implemented in

FAR 6.302-

need not be provided for when a statute expressly authorizes or requires that the acquisition be made through

d. If any prior award was accomplished by full and open competition, a detailed explanation of the changed circumstances: Not applicable, prior requirements were awarded sole source. As indicated in paragraph 10.a.i. above, the initial SBIR Phase I contract, W913E5-13-C-0005, was competitively solicited and awarded as a Firm-Fixed Price contract on 23 January 2013 at a total value of $149,940.00 for a six-month period of performance.

e. An explanation of any unusual patterns which may be revealed by the history, e.g., several consecutive, urgent buys: Not applicable, no unusual patterns have been revealed.

f. If a justification was prepared to support the procurement before this one, briefly describe the circumstances justifying the buy and whether there have been any significant changes: As identified above in 10a. and 10c. prior justifications were prepared pursuant to FAR 6.302-1(a)(1)(2) and 13.501(a)(1)(i), as applicable. The circumstances remain the same.