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JSA Riverbed Maintenance VA-23-00099020

JUSTIFICATION

FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

1. Contracting Activity: Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)

Office of Procurement, Acquisition, and Logistics Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way Eatontown, NJ 07724

2. Description of Action: This proposed action is for the award of a firm-fixed-price delivery order issued under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Governmentwide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for brand name Riverbed hardware and software maintenance support.

3. Description of the Supplies or Services: VA, Electronic Health Records Modernization Integration Office (EHRM-IO) has a requirement for hardware support to ensure that each deployed Riverbed AR11 device will function as intended. To accomplish this, VA must purchase maintenance for the (119) devices to make them current with the latest software (firmware) version. VA currently deploys brand name Riverbed SteelCentral AppResponse 11 (AR11) network monitoring devices in support of the Cerner EHRM IO deployment for VA as required across the VA Enterprise Wide-Area Network (WAN).

Through this effort, VA will receive hardware and software maintenance support, which includes but is not limited to trouble shooting of issues, software updates, help desk support, hardware replacement parts, and all required software updates and patches. In addition, maintenance support includes monitoring the performance of each device to ensure that each Riverbed AR11 passively monitors VA’s WAN and collects packet data for continuous real-time and historical monitoring and troubleshooting; enabling sites to reduce slowdowns and avoid outages. This action is for hardware and software maintenance support only. New hardware or software will not be procured or renewed as a result of this action.

The Period of Performance shall be a 12-month base period plus two 12-month option periods. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

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4. Statutory Authority: Pursuant to Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 16.505(a)(4), the following brand-name requirement is being justified and approved as an exception to fair opportunity under the statutory authority of Section 41 U.S.C. 4106(c)(2) as implemented by the FAR 16.505(b)(2)(i)(B), entitled “Only one awardee is capable of providing the supplies or services required at the level of quality required because the supplies or services ordered are unique or highly specialized.”

5. Rationale Supporting Use of Authority Cited Above: Based on market research, as described in Section 8 of this document, the only sources capable of providing the required brand name maintenance of the Riverbed AR11 products is the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) Riverbed or its authorized resellers. Based on the market research it also was determined that limited competition would be available among authorized resellers.

The deployed Riverbed AR11 devices covered under this effort were purchased in fiscal years (FYs) 2018 through 2020. The Riverbed AR11 passively monitors VA's WAN and collects network packet data for continuous real-time and historical monitoring and troubleshooting; this enables the sites within the VA’s WAN network infrastructure to identify and correct performance issues and avoid outages.

Only brand name Riverbed maintenance services will meet all the technical requirements. Specifically, the existing network-based application performance monitoring solution for the VA Enterprise is the Riverbed SteelCentral NetProfiler, which provides VA network engineers a view of the entire VA network required to isolate application performance issues using the metrics and packet captures reported by the Riverbed AR11 device. The integration between the existing Riverbed SteelCentral NetProfiler and the Riverbed AR11 is proprietary in nature. Specifically, Riverbed utilizes proprietary source code to transmit messages and data between the Riverbed AR11s and the NetProfiler. As such, maintenance providers of the Riverbed AR11 devices must have access to the proprietary source code in order to develop and deploy software patches that seamlessly interoperate with the device. Further, replacement parts must meet form, fit and specification of Riverbeds proprietary devises. These replacement parts must be able to fit within the size limitations of the existing device, no other brand name parts will fit. As part of the maintenance process, specifically the Riverbed AR11 Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) process, the devise is securely shipped to Riverbed for review and repair/replacement, then sent back to VA.

Further, VA requires that any maintenance provided allow for interoperability with the joint infrastructure shared with Department of Defense (DoD). Use of any other brand name maintenance support would create unnecessary complication and risks to the joint security posture. Having multiple brand name products and maintenance fails to meet the VA requirement that data be shared seamlessly with DoD Medical Community of Interest (MEDCOI). Specifically, the DoD MEDCOI Network would deny application performance data from monitoring devices of a different brand as it is wholly comprised of Riverbed products. The joint architecture was agreed upon in the DoD/VA Joint Electronic Health Record (JEHR) Architecture Description version 1.0, dated 13 February 2018. The JEHR solution required establishment of an interoperable and secure communications infrastructure between DHA operational locations, VA medical sites, and regional and enterprise data center’s hosting services which interface with the JEHR. If VA pursued any other vendor’s hardware maintenance support services, it would require a total replacement of the application performance monitoring infrastructure, which would result in extensive delivery delays and prohibitive costs. XX

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In addition, without the ability to receive adequate maintenance support, VA will be unable to maintain adequate surveillance of the Riverbed AR11s provided throughout the joint network and ensure data flows seamlessly, leaving both Agencies in a vulnerable state. Specifically, failure to meet this requirement limits both agencies from identifying root cause/issues, and inhibits alleviating those issues in real time, while also creating unnecessary complexities of review/coordination/execution of remediation.

Given the above, VA must procure the required brand name Riverbed maintenance as proposed to meet current technical requirements and mitigate further risk to the Agency.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in Section 8 of this justification. This effort did not yield any additional sources that can meet the Government's requirements. However, the undersigned VA technical representative determined that limited competition is available among authorized resellers for brand name Riverbed AR11 hardware maintenance support. In accordance with FAR 16.505(a)(4)(iii)(A)(1), this justification will be provided with the solicitation to all appropriate NASA SEWP V GWAC holders. Furthermore, in accordance with FAR 5.301, 16.505(b)(2)(ii)(D), and 16.505(a)(4)(iii), the award notice for this action will be synopsized on the Federal Business Opportunities website and this justification will be made publicly available within 14 days of award.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: The Government will continue to conduct market research to ascertain if there are changes in the marketplace that would enable future actions to be competed.

8. Market Research: Market Research has been ongoing since FY 2018 and was recertified in May 2024, to review the market for both alternative products and potential maintenance providers. Specifically, VA technical experts reviewed comparable solutions and hardware maintenance support services to include Netscout Systems, Inc (OEM: nGeniusOne), Juniper Networks (OEM: tcpdump) and Trellix FireEye (OEM:

Splunk). Based on this market research it was determined that no viable alternatives to the VA-specified networking hardware and software maintenance support offerings for the existing appliances are currently available from other manufacturers. Specifically, none of these vendors have access to Riverbed’s proprietary source code and other proprietary data of the software to provide maintenance support for this effort, nor can other manufacturers meet the technical, functional, or interoperability requirements that are identified in Section 5 of this document.

Further Market Research was conducted in September 2023 by using the NASA SEWP V GWAC Provider Lookup Tool to search for Riverbed resellers. The search yielded 77 re-sellers, including 15 VetCert Certified Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Businesses (SDVOSBs), therefore there is reasonable expectation that limited competition exists on the NASA SEWP V GWAC.

9. Other Facts: None.

10. Technical/Requirements Certification I certify that the supporting data under my cognizance, which are included in this justification, are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

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11. Fair and Reasonable Price Determination I hereby determine that the anticipated price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable based on a comparison of the successful quote to other quotes received in response to the solicitation. Additionally, the successful quote will be compared to the Independent Government Cost Estimate. Finally, the successful quote may be compared to pricing indexes, and competitive published list pricings for the same or similar products.

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12. Contracting Officer Certification/Approval

I certify that this justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

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Office of General Counsel (OGC) Review I have reviewed this document and find it legally sufficient, based on the representations set forth in the documents and, if any, attachments. The Competition Advocate’s approval is an independently supported decision not wholly reliant on the legal sufficiency determination.

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Advocate for Competition Approval In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of brand-name Riverbed hardware and software maintenance support on an other than fair opportunity basis pursuant to the authority cited in Section 4 above, subject to availability of funds, and provided that the property and services herein described have otherwise been authorized for acquisition.

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