DARPA-BAA-11-40 BOLT.pdf

Broad Agency Announcement I2O Broad Operational Language Translation (BOLT)

DARPA-BAA-11-40

April 4, 2011

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Information Innovation Office 3701 North Fairfax Drive Arlington, VA 22203-1714

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT i

Table of Contents Part I: Overview

Part II: Full Text of Announcement

I. FUNDING OPPORTUNITY DESCRIPTION

II. AWARD

III. ELIGIBILITY

A. Applicants

1. Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Small Businesses, Small Disadvantaged Businesses and Minority Institutions

2. Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) and Government entities

3. Foreign Participation

B. Procurement Integrity

C. Cost Sharing/Matching

D. Other Eligibility Requirements

1. Submission of Proposals to Multiple Technical Areas

IV. APPLICATION

A. Announcement

B. Proposals

C. Proprietary and Classified Information

D. Submission Instructions

1. Due Dates

2. Unclassified Submission

3. Classified Submission

E. Intergovernmental Review

F. Funding Restrictions

G. Other Submission Requirements

V. EVALUATION

A. Evaluation Criteria

B. Review and Selection Process

VI. AWARD ADMINISTRATION

A. Selection Notices

B. Administrative and National Policy Requirements

1. Meeting and Travel Requirements

2. Intellectual Property

3. Human Use

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT i

4. Animal Use

5. Publication Approval

6. Export Control

7. Electronic and Information Technology

8. Employment Eligibility Verification

9. Reporting Executive Compensation and First-Tier Subcontract Awards

C. Reporting

D. Electronic Systems

VII. AGENCY CONTACTS

VIII. OTHER INFORMATION

A. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

B. Collaborative Efforts/Teaming

C. Industry Day

D. Cost Proposal Checklist

E. Submission Checklist

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 1

Part I: Overview

Federal Agency Name – Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Information Innovation Office (I2O)

Funding Opportunity Title – Boundless Operational Language Translation

(BOLT)

Announcement Type – Initial Announcement

Funding Opportunity Number – DARPA-BAA-11-40

Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance Numbers (CFDA) –12.910 Research and Technology Development

Dates o Posting Date – see announcement at www.fbo.gov o Proposal Due Date

Initial Closing – 12:00 noon (ET), May 19, 2011 Final Closing – 12:00 noon (ET), August 2, 2011 o Industry Day – 9:00 am ET, April 12, 2011

Anticipated Individual Awards – DARPA anticipates multiple awards of 6.2 funding for each Technical Area.

Types of Instruments that may be Awarded – Procurement contract, cooperative agreement, or other transaction.

Technical POC: Dr Joseph Olive, Program Manager, DARPA/I2O

BAA Mailbox: DARPA-BAA-11-40@darpa.mil

BAA Mailing Address:

o ATTN: DARPA-BAA-11-40 3701 North Fairfax Drive Arlington, VA 22203-1714

I2O Solicitation Website:

http://www.darpa.mil/Opportunities/Solicitations/I2O_Solicitations.aspx mailto:DARPA-BAA-11-40@darpa.mil http://www.darpa.mil/Opportunities/Solicitations/I2O_Solicitations.aspx

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 2

Part II: Full Text of Announcement

I. FUNDING OPPORTUNITY DESCRIPTION

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) often selects its research efforts through the Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) process. This BAA is being issued, and any resultant selection for negotiation and/or award will be made, using procedures under FAR Part 35.016 (DoDGARS Part 22 for Cooperative Agreements).

Any negotiations and/or awards will use procedures under FAR 15.4, Contract Pricing, as specified in the BAA (including DoDGARS Part 22 for Cooperative Agreements).

Proposals received as a result of this BAA shall be evaluated in accordance with evaluation criteria specified herein through a scientific review process. The BAA will appear first on the Federal Business Opportunities website, http://www.fedbizopps.gov/, and Grants.gov website at http://www.grants.gov/. The following information is for those wishing to respond to the BAA.

DARPA seeks strong, responsive proposals from well-qualified sources for a new Human Language Technology (HLT) research and development program called Broad Operational Language Translation (BOLT). The goal of the BOLT program is to create technology capable of translating multiple foreign languages in all genres, retrieve information from the translated material, and enable bilingual communication via speech or text. Proposed research should investigate innovative approaches that enable revolutionary advances in science, devices, or systems. Specifically excluded is research that primarily results in evolutionary improvements to the existing state of practice.

TERMINOLOGY

The following terms are used throughout this document and are provided for reference.

Speech Audio signal (digital waveform)

Text Ordinary text (in machine readable form) or automatically transcribed speech

English Text Text (including automatically transcribed speech) that was originally in English or that was translated into English

Source Language Language in which the speech or text originated

Metric A numerical measure of performance

User Interface Software by which users and algorithms interact http://www.fedbizopps.gov/ http://www.grants.gov/

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INTRODUCTION

The United States has a compelling need for reliable information affecting military command, soldiers in the field and national security. Currently, volumes of raw data stream in from around the globe in many languages and media (speech and text).

Given the quantity of data, it is difficult to find and interpret the salient pieces of information. The United States also has a compelling need to perform multi-turn communication with non-English speaking local populations of foreign countries and allies.

In order to meet these needs, the envisioned program has the following specific goals:

accurate translation into English of all language genres, including informal speech and text such as occurs in e-mail, messaging and conversational speech in Arabic (including a variety of dialects such as Levantine or Iraqi) and Mandarin Chinese, capability for human-machine communication by voice in English and Arabic using multi-modal input for robotic control or desk-top applications and multi-turn, bilingual human-human conversation in speech or text including a monolingual human-machine dialogue in both languages for clarification and disambiguation, capability to retrieve targeted information from multi-lingual sources using natural language English queries with human-machine clarification and disambiguation dialogue and means to annotate documents (textual or spoken) for fast comprehensive search, research in deep semantic language acquisition using robotic visual and tactile information as input for experiential learning of objects, actions, and consequences, and research in basic technologies such as parsing, Semantic Role Labeling (SRL), language modeling, etc. that are essential to the success of the above.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION AND STRUCTURE

The BOLT Program is comprised of three Technical Areas which are described in detail below.

Technical Area 1: Algorithmic Development and Integrated Systems Technical Area 2: Data Collection Technical Area 3: Evaluation

Each Technical Area is currently planned as a 5 phase effort with each phase nominally being 12 months. However, some of the activities within the Technical Areas should require fewer than five phases. While these phase lengths are what DARPA is anticipating, offerors should propose phase schedules that realistically match the proposed efforts. The notional program schedule is shown below. Proposals must address all phases. While DARPA anticipates making multiple awards in each Technical Area, it is not expected that all teams will perform across all phases.

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Offerors may submit proposals for all three Technical Areas however, offerors selected for any portion of Technical Areas 1 and/or 2 cannot be selected for any portion of Technical Area 3. See Section III.D.1 for further information. Offerors submitting to multiple technical areas must submit a separate proposal for each.

TECHNICAL AREA DESCRIPTIONS

Technical Area 1: Algorithmic Development and Integrated Systems DARPA seeks technology, software development, and language processing algorithms in each of the Activities listed below. This includes the development of three integrated, end-to-end systems, each with the capability of accepting algorithms developed under Activity F:

1. Genre-Independent Translation and Information Retrieval System (Activity A),

2. Human-Machine Communication System (Activity B), or

3. Human-Human Dialogue System (Activity C)

Each system must have an architecture configured for ease of incorporating a variety of technologies and algorithms. An example of one such architecture is the IBM freeware, open source Unstructured Information Management Architecture (UIMA). Other proposed architectures will be considered, but it will be the responsibility of the offeror to ensure that their interface is compatible with the interface that DARPA selects (to be decided before the start of the program). There is no preferred hardware platform.

Proposals may be submitted for any of the following Activities. Proposals addressing more than one Activity must have both a separate cost as well as a combined cost for any of the Activity combinations.

The metrics described for each Activity below indicate the level of performance that

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DARPA expects to achieve by the end of the program. In order to measure progress, each Technical Area 1 proposal must show a phased time line with present technology capabilities (baseline) and interim suitable metrics which provides a clear roadmap for achieving the final metrics. Each offeror must propose a schedule showing the total length of research, the number and length of each phase of research, and the definition of intermediate (phase) metrics which enable the final performance metrics to be achieved. As stated previously, DARPA anticipates that each of these efforts will be completed in five phases. However, if the offeror believes that the final desired performance may be achieved in a shorter time, this should be indicated in the proposed schedule and program roadmap. Evaluation of performance will be as outlined in the Technical Area 3 description below.

Activity A. Genre-Independent Translation and Information Retrieval System:

foreign language monitoring capabilities to include translation into English and targeted information retrieval in both the source language and English.

Genre-Independent Translation: Accurate translation into English of all language genres, including informal speech and text, such as occurs in e-mail, messaging, and conversational speech in Mandarin Chinese and at least one Arabic dialect (e.g., Levantine or Iraqi). The first Arabic dialect to be addressed will be determined at the beginning of the program. Additional dialects may be phased in later in the program.

Metric: informal language test material will consist of e-mails, messaging (SMS), and telephone conversations. Overall average accuracy as measured by Human Translation Error Rate (HTER) should exceed 90%. See data description in the Technical Area 2 section.

Information Retrieval: Capability to retrieve targeted information from foreign language sources for which machine translation exists using English natural language queries with human-machine clarification and disambiguation dialogue.

This includes the means to annotate documents (textual or spoken) for fast comprehensive search.

Metric: the target accuracy for finding all of the relevant information represented as non-redundant entries with complete citations for multiple occurrences is 90% for 90% of the test queries, using textual natural language queries with capability for ambiguity resolution dialogue.

Activity B. Human-Machine Communication System: development of a system providing the capability for human-machine communication in English and one Arabic dialect (dialect to be determined by DARPA at the beginning of the program) using multi-modal input for robotic control, a desk-top application, or any other method that will demonstrate human control involving complex commands.

Metric: Complex commands to control a desk-top application (e.g., Microsoft Excel, e-mail, web browsing, etc.) or a robot requiring a minimum of 10

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sequential commands with a task completion rate exceeding 90%.

Activity C. Human-Human Dialogue System: development of a system enabling multi-turn, bilingual human-human conversation with English and one Arabic dialect (dialect to be determined by DARPA at the beginning of the program) speech or text, as well as monolingual human-machine dialogue in both languages for clarification and disambiguation.

Metric: English and Arabic human-human conversation (text or speech) requiring 5 complete turns with a successful completion rate exceeding 90%.

Activity D. Arabic Dialect Components: Technological components for accurate translation into English of no fewer than five Arabic dialects, to be determined by DARPA at the beginning of the program. The first two dialects will be addressed in Phases 1 and 2; the second two dialects will be addressed in Phases 3 and 4; the final dialect will be addressed in Phase 5.

Metric: The dialectal Arabic to English translation output of a machine translation system to which the Arabic dialect components developed under this Activity have been incorporated should have an overall average accuracy as measured by Human Translation Error Rate (HTER) exceeding 90%.

Performance on the first two dialects must reach the 90% metric by the end of Phase 3; the second two dialects must reach the 90% metric by the end of Phase 4; the final dialect must reach the 90% metric by the end of Phase 5.

Activity E. Grounded Language Acquisition: research in deep semantic language acquisition using robotic visual and tactile information as input for experiential learning of objects, actions, and consequences. Enable robots to acquire language capabilities by grounding objects (nouns and associated adjectives) and actions (verbs and adverbs – pre-state, initial state, intermediate state, and final state) and give them the ability to hypothesize and perform automated reasoning in the acquired language.

Metric: A robot equipped with vision and tactile inputs will be expected to recognize 250 objects varying in color, shape, size, etc., and understand the consequences (pre-state and post-state) of 100 actions so that it can execute complex commands with 90% completion rate.

Activity F. Basic Technologies: Research in basic technologies (e.g., parsing, SRL, language modeling, discourse analysis, co-reference resolution, dialogue turn analysis, automatic evaluation, etc.) which are essential to the success of the above Activities.

Metric: The metric for this Activity is to show progress at the end of each phase.

Progress will include both significant improvement in the accuracy of the technology itself (self-assessment) and improvement in any Activity that uses the technology (i.e., Activity A, Activity B, or Activity C). The performer(s) of the algorithm research (Activity F) as well as the performer(s) of Activity A, Activity B, DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 7 and Activity C will be responsible for integrating and using the algorithm(s) in the systems described above. During proposal evaluation, extensive consideration will be given to the adaptability of the algorithms and technology components to the various BOLT integrated systems and to the proposed means of support to be provided by the algorithm/technology component developers to the Activity A performers, who will accomplish the integration. The Technical Area 3 performer for this Activity will be responsible for determining the effectiveness of the technology at increasing the accuracy of the integrated system to which it has been incorporated.

Each proposal for Activity A, Activity B, or Activity C must provide a plan for a flexible system architecture capable of plugging in different technology components and algorithms which the offeror or other performers have developed and incorporating their output into the decision making process for the final output. In addition, the plan must show a clear method for interfacing the component technologies into the architecture.

The openness of the architecture proposed and the processes for integrating technology from other BOLT program participants will be given extensive consideration during the proposal evaluation.

The data to be used for each Activity will be provided as outlined in the Technical Area 2 description below. Performers will be expected to consistently improve their technologies’ performance in each successive phase in order to meet the target program metrics. Activity F performers will be expected to execute self-assessments throughout the period of performance. Evaluations will be held near the end of each phase. DARPA intends to keep the types of performance metrics consistent throughout all phases, but may introduce new types of test data, such as data collected under varying field conditions. Every proposal for Technical Area 1 must include a description of the methodology and algorithms which will be developed to achieve the metrics cited below.

Before the evaluation period in each phase, each Technical Area 1 performer for Activities A-E will be required to support the needs of the Technical Area 3 performer(s) by providing access to all algorithm and component software as well as the integrated systems; addressing software instrumentation needs; identifying failure causes; and responding to any other test-related issues.

Technical Area 2: Data Collection Data is to be collected as outlined below. All data collected must be unclassified.

Activity A. Genre-Independent Translation and Information Retrieval System:

Collections will be made in three genres AND in three languages as follows. All data will be translated, aligned and annotated for parsing, and semantic roles.

English: 2 million words of email, 2 million words of messaging and 2 million words of conversation.

Arabic (one dialect, e.g., Levantine or Iraqi to be chosen by DARPA): 2 million words of email, 2 million words of messaging and 2 million words of

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conversation.

Mandarin Chinese: 2 million words of email, 2 million words of messaging and 2 million words of conversation.

Activity D. Data for Arabic Dialect Components:

Data in five dialects of Arabic will be collected at a rate of two dialects per year for the first two years and one in the third year. For each dialect, one million words of text (any genre) and one million words of transcribed speech will be collected.

These collections will be annotated to enable natural language processing and translation. Offerors will detail the necessary annotations.

Proposals must contain a plan consisting of a data collection matrix which specifies, at a minimum:

the source of the data, the amount to be collected, and the languages or dialects of the data.

In addition, offerors must provide an approach and a schedule for collecting, annotating, and furnishing all data. Proposed schedules must be at least as aggressive as the example schedule shown in the figure below.

Approximately 10% of the data will be held back for the purpose of evaluation (see Technical Area 3) and will not be available for training. This data will be given to the Technical Area 3 performers as applicable.

Technical Area 3: Evaluation The goal of this Technical Area is to construct evaluation frameworks and to measure the performance of the technologies and/or systems developed in Technical Area 1 against the metrics defined above

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The Evaluation Activities are as follows:

Activity A. Testing the Multilingual Information Retrieval System(s) (Technical Area 1 Activity A) for: (1) the translation quality of the system by comparing system output to carefully-produced human references, and (2) the quantity and quality of the information retrieved in response to queries.

Information retrieval capability will be tested for English, Arabic and Chinese and translation quality will be tested for Arabic and Chinese.

In addition, this evaluation team will be responsible for testing the effectiveness of the algorithms developed in Technical Area 1 Activity D (Arabic Dialect Components) and Activity F (Basic Technologies) through the use of automated measurements made by running the Multilingual Information Retrieval System with and without these algorithms.

At the end of Phase 1, translation of e-mail messages will be tested; testing of messaging will be added in Phase 2; Phases 3-5 will include testing on all three genres (e-mail, messaging, and conversation) using the Human Translation Error Rate (HTER) testing method.

Activity B. Testing the Human-Machine Communication System for ten sequential commands. In addition, this evaluation team will be responsible for testing the effectiveness of the algorithms developed in Technical Area 1 Activity D (Arabic Dialect Components) and Activity F (Basic Technologies) through the use of automated measurements made by running the Human-Machine Communication System with and without these algorithms.

Activity C. Testing the Human-Human Dialogue System for five complete sequential dialogue turns. In addition, this evaluation team will be responsible for testing the effectiveness of the algorithms developed in Technical Area 1 Activity D (Arabic Dialect Components) and Activity F (Basic Technologies) through the use of automated measurements made by running the Human-Human Dialogue System with and without these algorithms.

Activity E. Testing for completion of Technical Area 1 Activity E (Grounded Language Acquisition).

Each Evaluation Activity above will use well-defined measurement methods and will be required to meet specific pre-determined levels of performance (i.e., metrics), which will be set by DARPA with consideration to the specifications of the Technical Area 1 performers. Specifics of the implementation of each Evaluation Activity will be defined in an Evaluation Specification Document, which will describe the data, tasks, test protocols, and metrology. Proposals must include a preliminary Evaluation Specification Document for each of the Evaluation Activities proposed.

Each Technical Area 3 offeror must develop an evaluation methodology and identify the data and graphical presentation format to be used to measure and display the

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performance of each Evaluation Activity proposed. The description of the methodology in the proposal must address the issue of adequate data sample size to ensure statistical significance. Proposals must identify a schedule for each Evaluation Activity, indicating suitable interim metrics which define percent of completion. The offeror will define the list of techniques used to perform the evaluations and will acquire, implement, and modify, as applicable, any software necessary to perform the proposed Evaluation Activities (see Intellectual Property section below and in Section VII.B.2 for further information). Technical Area 3 performer(s) will conduct the evaluations, measure algorithm performance, analyze the results, and prepare final reports and briefings. To support each evaluation, the Technical Area 3 performer(s) will be provided with access to all system and component software developed by the Technical Area 1 teams for the Activity they are evaluating. The Technical Area 3 performer(s) will work in close coordination with the Technical Area 1 teams to define any necessary interface standards and to ensure test operability.

DELIVERABLES

Deliverables will be required as outlined below and in Section VII.C.

Technical Area 1 Performers:

Prior to the conclusion of each phase (specific delivery dates to be decided at award), all Technical Area 1 performers are expected to submit:

Interim briefings and status reports

All software and supporting documentation developed in the program.

A written final report of their activities and accomplishments.

Performers for Activity A, Activity B, and Activity C will submit the applicable integrated system(s) (as specified in Technical Area 1 description) to be evaluated at the site of the Evaluation Team for that Activity.

Technical Area 2 Performers:

Data (as outlined in the Technical Area 2 description) will be delivered to the

Technical Area 1 performers according to the schedule as accepted by DARPA and inform DARPA of the deliveries.

Technical Area 3 Performers:

Two weeks prior to each phase conclusion, each Technical Area 3 performer is expected to submit to the Government the following deliverables for their specific Activity:

All test datasets and supporting information, including ground truth annotations.

All Evaluation Activity results.

All software and supporting documentation developed in the program.

A written final report of its own activities and accomplishments, a comparative summary of the Development Teams’ results, and the Evaluation Teams’ conclusions regarding the results of the Development Teams for the Activities that they have been selected to evaluate.

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INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

Intellectual Property rights will be considered as part of proposal evaluation. In general, less restrictive rights will be considered more favorably than more restrictive rights. See Section VI.B.2 for further information

II. AWARD

Multiple awards are anticipated. The level of funding for individual awards made under this BAA has not been predetermined and will depend on the quality of the proposals received and the availability of funds. Awards will be made to offerors whose proposals are determined to be the most advantageous and provide the best value to the Government, all factors considered, including the potential contributions of the proposed work, overall funding strategy, and availability of funding for the effort. See Sections V.A. and V.B. for further information.

Proposals selected for award negotiation may result in a procurement contract, cooperative agreement, or other transaction depending upon the nature of the work proposed, the required degree of interaction between parties, and other factors. The Government contracting officer shall have sole discretion to negotiate instrument provisions with selectees.

Some projects funded under this BAA are expected to be fundamental research, basic and applied research in science and engineering, the results of which are ordinarily published and shared broadly within the scientific community, as distinguished from proprietary research and from industrial development, design, production, and product utilization, the results of which are ordinarily restricted for proprietary or national security reasons. Notwithstanding this expectation, DARPA will also consider research proposals that, while perhaps not qualifying as fundamental research under the foregoing definition, meet the BAA criteria for submissions. See Section VI.B.5 below for further information on fundamental research. If proposals are selected for award that offer other than a fundamental research solution, then DARPA will either work with the offeror to modify the proposed statement of work to bring the research back into line with fundamental research or else the offeror will agree to restrictions in order to receive an award. In all cases, the contracting officer shall have sole discretion to select award instrument type and to negotiate all instrument provisions with selectees.

In addition, the Government reserves its rights to the following:

to select for negotiation all, some, one, or none of the proposals received in response to this solicitation, to make awards without discussions with offerors, to conduct discussions if it is later determined to be necessary, to segregate portions of resulting awards into pre-priced options, to accept proposals in their entirety or to select only portions of proposals for award, to fund proposals in phases with options for continued work at the end of one or more of the phases, DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 12 to request any additional, necessary documentation once it makes the award instrument determination; such additional information may include but is not limited to Representations and Certifications; and, to remove offerors from award consideration should the parties fail to reach agreement on award terms, conditions and cost/price within a reasonable time or the offeror fails to timely provide requested additional information.

III. ELIGIBILITY

A. Applicants All responsible sources capable of satisfying the Government's needs may submit a proposal that shall be considered by DARPA.

1. Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Small Businesses, Small

Disadvantaged Businesses and Minority Institutions

Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Small Businesses, Small Disadvantaged Businesses and Minority Institutions (MIs) are encouraged to submit proposals and join others in submitting proposals; however, no portion of this announcement will be set aside for these organizations’ participation due to the impracticality of reserving discrete or severable areas of this research for exclusive competition among these entities.

2. Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) and

Government Entities

FFRDCs and Government entities (e.g., military educational institutions, etc.) are subject to applicable direct competition limitations and cannot propose to this BAA in any capacity (as prime or sub) unless they address the following conditions.

FFRDCs must clearly demonstrate that the work is not otherwise available from the private sector AND must also provide a letter on letterhead from their sponsoring organization citing the specific authority establishing their eligibility to propose to Government solicitations in compliance with the associated FFRDC sponsor agreement terms and conditions. This information is required for FFRDCs proposing to be prime contractor or subcontractors.

Government entities must clearly demonstrate that the work is not otherwise available from the private sector and provide written documentation citing the specific statutory authority (as well as, where relevant, contractual authority) establishing their ability to propose to Government solicitations.

At the present time, DARPA does not consider 15 U.S.C. 3710a to be sufficient legal authority to show eligibility. While 10 U.S.C. 2539b may be the appropriate statutory starting point for some entities, specific supporting regulatory guidance, together with evidence of agency approval, will still be required to fully establish eligibility.

DARPA will consider eligibility submissions on a case-by-case basis; however, the burden to prove eligibility for all team members rests solely with the offeror.

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3. Foreign Participation

Foreign participants and/or individuals may participate to the extent that such participants comply with any necessary Non-Disclosure Agreements, Security Regulations, Export Control Laws, and other governing statutes applicable under the circumstances.

B. Procurement Integrity Current Federal employees are prohibited from participating in particular matters involving conflicting financial, employment, and representational interests (18 U.S.C 203, 205, and 208). Prior to the start of proposal evaluation, the Government will assess potential conflicts of interest and promptly notify the offeror if any appear to exist. The Government assessment does not affect, offset, or mitigate the offeror’s duty to give full notice and planned mitigation for all potential organizational conflicts, as discussed below.

In accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) 9.503 and without prior approval or a waiver from the DARPA Director, a contractor cannot simultaneously be a SETA contractor and a performer. FAR citations are at https://www.acquisition.gov/FAR/.

As part of the proposal submission, offerors and proposed subcontractors must affirm whether they (individuals and organizations) are providing scientific, engineering, and technical assistance (SETA) or similar support to any DARPA technical office(s) through an active contract or subcontract. Affirmations must state which office(s) the offeror and/or proposed subcontractor supports and must provide prime contract numbers. All facts relevant to the existence or potential existence of organizational conflicts of interest (FAR 9.5) must be disclosed. The disclosure shall include a description of the action the offeror has taken or proposes to take to avoid, neutralize, or mitigate such conflict. Proposals that fail to fully disclose potential conflicts of interest and/or do not have plans to mitigate this conflict may be rejected without technical evaluation and withdrawn from further consideration for award.

If a prospective offeror believes a conflict of interest exists or may exist (whether organizational or otherwise) or has a question on what constitutes a conflict, the offeror should promptly raise the issue with DARPA by sending the offeror's contact information and a summary of the potential conflict to the BAA mailbox before preparing a proposal and mitigation plan. If, in the sole opinion of the Government after full consideration of the circumstances, any conflict situation cannot be effectively mitigated, the proposal may be rejected without technical evaluation and withdrawn from further consideration for award under this BAA.

C. Cost Sharing/Matching Cost sharing is not required for this particular program; however, cost sharing will be carefully considered if proposed.

https://www.acquisition.gov/FAR/

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D. Other Eligibility Requirements

1. Submission of Proposals to Multiple Technical Areas While offerors may submit proposals for all three Technical Areas, offerors selected for any portion of Technical Area 3 (Evaluation) cannot be selected for any portion of the other two Technical Areas, whether as a prime, subcontractor, or in any other capacity from an organizational to individual level. This is to avoid organizational conflict of interest situations between the Technical Areas and to ensure objective test and evaluation results. The decision as to which proposal to consider for award is at the discretion of the Government.

IV. APPLICATION

A. Announcement This announcement contains all information required to respond to this solicitation and constitutes the total BAA. No additional forms, kits, or other materials are needed. No request for proposal (RFP) or additional solicitation regarding this opportunity will be issued nor is additional information available except as provided at the FedBizOpps website (http://www.fbo.gov) and at Grants.gov (http://www.grants.gov) or referenced in this document.

B. Proposals Proposals consist of two volumes: the Technical and Management Proposal (including Appendix A) and the Cost Proposal.

All pages shall be formatted for printing on 8-1/2- by 11-inch paper with a font size not smaller than 12 point. A font size of 10 point may be used for figures, tables and charts.

Document files must be in Portable Document Format (.pdf, ISO 32000-1), OpenDocument (.odx, ISO/IEC 26300:2006 ), .doc, .docx, .xls, .or .xlsx formats.

Submissions must be written in English. Proposals not meeting the format prescribed herein may not be reviewed.

1. Volume I: Technical and Management Proposal

The page limits identified in brackets for specific sections in Volume I includes all figures, tables, and charts but does not include the cover sheet, table of contents or Appendix A. Note, Appendix A is required and will be reviewed as part of the proposal.

A submission letter is optional, and is not included in the page count.

Volume I must include the following components:

a. Cover Sheet:

BAA number http://www.fbo.gov/ http://www.grants.gov/

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Technical Area

Lead organization (prime contractor)

Type of business, selected from among the following categories: ―LARGE

BUSINESS‖, ―SMALL DISADVANTAGED BUSINESS‖, ―OTHER SMALL

BUSINESS‖, ―HBCU‖, ―MI‖, ―OTHER EDUCATIONAL‖, OR ―OTHER

NONPROFIT‖

Contractor’s reference number (if any)

Other team members (if applicable) and type of business for each

Proposal title

Technical point of contact to include: name, mailing address, telephone, email, and fax

Administrative point of contact to include: name, mailing address, telephone, email, and fax

Award instrument requested: cost-plus-fixed-free (CPFF), cost-contract—no fee, cost sharing contract – no fee, or other type of procurement contract (specify), grant, cooperative agreement or other transaction agreement (Information on award instruments is available at http://www.darpa.mil/Opportunities/Contract_Management/Contract_Managemen t.aspx)

Place(s) and period(s) of performance

Subcontractor Information

Proposal validity period (minimum 120 days)

DUNS number (https://eupdate.dnb.com/requestoptions.asp?cm_re=HomepageB*TopNav*DUN SNumberTab)

Taxpayer ID number (http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/international/article/0,,id=96696,00.html)

CAGE code (http://www.dlis.dla.mil/CAGESearch/cage_faq.asp)

Label: ―PROPOSAL: VOLUME I‖ http://www.darpa.mil/Opportunities/Contract_Management/Contract_Management.aspx http://www.darpa.mil/Opportunities/Contract_Management/Contract_Management.aspx https://eupdate.dnb.com/requestoptions.asp?cm_re=HomepageB*TopNav*DUNSNumberTab https://eupdate.dnb.com/requestoptions.asp?cm_re=HomepageB*TopNav*DUNSNumberTab http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/international/article/0,,id=96696,00.html http://www.dlis.dla.mil/CAGESearch/cage_faq.asp

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 16

b. Table of Contents

c. Executive Summary [1 page per Activity] Provide a synopsis of the proposed project, including answers to the following questions:

What are you trying to do?

How is it done today and what are the limitations?

Who will care and what will the impact be if you are successful?

How much will it cost and how long will it take?

The summary should include a description of the key technical challenges, a concise review of the technologies proposed to overcome these challenges and achieve the program goal, and a clear statement of the novelty and uniqueness of the proposed idea.

d. Goals and Impact [2 pages per Activity] Clearly describe what the team is trying to achieve and the difference it will make (qualitatively and quantitatively) if successful. Describe the innovative aspects of the project in the context of existing capabilities and approaches, clearly delineating the uniqueness and benefits of this project in the context of the state of the art, alternative approaches, and other projects from the past and present. Describe how the proposed project is revolutionary and how it significantly rises above the current state of the art.

This section should describe the deliverables associated with the proposed project and any plans to commercialize the technology, transition it to a customer, or further the work. Assuming the technology transition plan is successful, this section should discuss the mitigation of any issues related to sustainment of the technology over its entire lifecycle.

e. Technical Plan [Technical Area 1 proposals: 2 pages per Activity + 1 additional page per algorithm for that Activity - up to 5 algorithms. Technical Area 2 and 3 proposals: 3 pages per Activity]

Outline and address technical challenges inherent in the approach and possible solutions for overcoming potential problems. This section should provide appropriate measurable milestones (quantitative if possible) at intermediate stages of the program to demonstrate progress, and a plan for achieving the milestones.

The technical plan should demonstrate a deep understanding of the technical challenges and present a credible (even if risky) plan to achieve the program goal.

Mitigation of technical risk should be discussed.

f. Management Plan [2 pages per Activity] Provide a summary of expertise of the team, including any subcontractors, and key personnel who will be doing the work. Resumes count against the section page

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count. A principal investigator for the project must be identified. A clear description of the team’s organization including an organization chart should be provided that includes, as applicable: the programmatic relationship of team members; the unique capabilities of team members; the responsibilities of team members, the teaming strategy among the team members; and key personnel with the amount of effort to be expended by each person during each year. Include a detailed plan for coordination including explicit guidelines for interaction among collaborators/subcontractors of the proposed effort. Risk management approaches should be included. Details of any formal teaming agreements that are required to execute this program should be discussed.

g. Capabilities [1/2 page per Activity] Briefly describe organizational experience in this area, existing intellectual property, specialized facilities, and any Government-furnished materials or data. Provide a discussion of and work in closely related research areas and previous accomplishments.

h. Statement of Work (SOW) [3 pages per Activity] The SOW should provide a detailed task breakdown, citing specific tasks and their connection to the interim milestones and program metrics. Each phase of the program should be separately defined.

For each Activity, provide:

A general description of the objective (for each defined task)

A detailed description of the approach to be taken to accomplish each defined task)

Identification of the primary organization responsible for task execution (prime, sub, team member, by name, etc.)

The exit criteria for each task - a product, event or milestone that defines its completion

A definition of all deliverables (data, reports, software, etc.) to be provided to the Government in support of the proposed research tasks.

Clearly identify any tasks (prime or subcontracted) that will be accomplished on-campus at a university.

The SOW must not include proprietary information.

i. Schedule and Milestones [1 page per Activity] Provide a detailed schedule showing tasks (task name, duration, WBS element as applicable, performing organization), milestones which identify major decision points and major accomplishments, and the interrelationships among tasks. The

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 18

task structure must be consistent with that in the SOW. Measurable milestones should be clearly articulated and defined in time relative to start of effort.

j. Cost Summary [1 page per activity] Provide a top level cost summary with cost totals for labor, materials, other direct charges (ODCs), general and administrative (G&A), and the proposed fee (if any) for the entire effort broken down by phase. Include estimates of cost for each task in each year of the effort delineated by the prime and major subcontractors, total cost and company cost share, if applicable. Any requests for Government-furnished equipment or Government-furnished information should be included on the summary page with cost estimates (if applicable).

Appendix A [No page limit]

a. Intellectual Property: If no restrictions are intended, then the offeror must state

―NONE‖.

Otherwise, per Section VI.B.2 below, provide a separate list of all technical data or computer software that will be furnished to the Government with other than unlimited rights. Include in this section all proprietary claims to results, prototypes, deliverables or systems supporting and/or necessary for the use of the research, results, prototypes and/or deliverables. The Government will assume unlimited rights if offerors fail to identify any intellectual property restrictions in their proposals.

b. Organizational Conflict of Interest Affirmations and Disclosure: If the offeror or any proposed subcontractor IS NOT currently providing SETA support as described (see Section III.B), then the offeror must state ―NONE.‖

Otherwise, provide the following information for the offeror and each proposed subcontractor, as applicable:

Prime Contract Number

DARPA Office supported

A description of the action the offeror has taken or proposes to take to avoid, neutralize, or mitigate the conflict

Proposals that fail to fully disclose potential conflicts of interests or do not have acceptable plans to mitigate identified conflicts may not be reviewed.

c. Human Use: If human use is not a factor in a proposal, then the offeror should state ―NONE.‖

Otherwise, for all proposed research that will involve human subjects in the first year or phase of the project, the offeror must provide evidence of or a plan for

DARPA I2O BOLT – BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT 19

review by an Institutional Review Board (IRB). For further information on this subject, see Section VI.B.3 below.

d. Animal Use: If animal use is not a factor in a proposal, then the offeror should state ―NONE.‖

Otherwise, for submissions containing animal use, proposals must briefly describe plans for Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) review and approval. For further information on this subject, see Section VI.B.4 below.

e. Statement of Unique Capability Provided by Government or FFRDC Team

Member If none of the team member organizations (prime or sub) belongs to a Government entity or FFRDC, then the offeror should state ―NONE.‖

Otherwise, per section III.A.2 above, provide a statement which clearly demonstrates the work being provided by the Government or Government-funded entity team member is not otherwise available from the private sector.

f. Government or FFRDC Team Member Eligibility: If none of the team member organizations (prime or sub) belongs to a Government entity or FFRDC, then the offeror should state ―NONE.‖

Otherwise, per section III.A.2 above, provide documentation citing the specific authority which establishes the applicable team member is eligible to propose to Government solicitations to include: 1) statutory authority; 2) contractual authority;

3) supporting regulatory guidance; AND 4) evidence of agency approval for applicable team member participation.

g. Team Member Identification: Provide a list of ALL team member organizations (prime and subcontractors). Identify specifically if they are a foreign entity, FFRDC and/or Government entity.

2. Volume II: Cost Proposal {No page limit}

Volume II must include the following components:

a. Cover Sheet :

The cover sheet should have the same information as the cover sheet for Volume I (see above) with the label ―PROPOSAL: VOLUME II.‖

b. Cost Summary (Note: this section must be a duplicate of section j in the

Technical Volume) Provide a top level cost summary with cost totals for labor, materials, other direct charges (ODCs), general and administrative (G&A), and the proposed fee (if any) for the entire effort broken down by phase. Include estimates of cost for each task in each year of the effort delineated by the prime and major subcontractors, total cost and company cost share, if applicable. Any requests for Government-furnished

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equipment or Government-furnished information should be included on the summary page with cost estimates (if applicable).

c. Detailed Cost Information Provide detailed cost information for direct labor (including labor categories), materials, and ODCs by month for each task of the project. Information provided for subcontractors must be at the same level of detail as that provided for prime contractors. Labor rates and labor hours should both be detailed in this analysis. A separate breakdown should be done for each proposed option. Costs must be traceable between prime and subcontractor as well as between the cost proposal and statement of work.

Summarize the task level cost information to give total expenditures on labor, materials, travel and ODCs by month for prime and sub contractors. Identify cost sharing (if any). Purchases of information technology (as defined at FAR 2.101) must be itemized. Provide totals for all cost categories.

The Cost Proposal should include a spreadsheet file (this may be provided as a separate component of the submission package) that provides formula traceability among all components of the cost proposal. The spreadsheet file should be included as a separate component of the zipped submission package.

For Information technology and equipment purchases that are equal to or greater than $50,000 for a single item, a letter should be included justifying the purchase using resources other than from internal funding.

The Defense Appropriations Act caps indirect cost rates for any procurement contract, cooperative agreement, or other transaction agreement using 6.1 Basic Research Funding at thirty-five (35) percent of the total cost of the award. See Section IV.G below for further information.

Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) citations are available at http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/browse/collectionCfr.action?collectionCode=CFR.

Supporting cost and pricing information shall include a description of the method used to estimate costs and supporting documentation. ―Cost or pricing data‖ as defined in FAR Subpart 15.4 shall be required if the offeror is seeking a procurement contract award of $700,000 or greater unless the offeror requests an exception from the requirement to submit this information. ―Cost or pricing data‖ is not required if the offeror proposes an award instrument other than a procurement contract (e.g., a cooperative agreement or other transaction agreement).

Pre-award costs are not reimbursable for awards under this BAA.

See the Cost…