J&A_DFAN_Flight_Simulators_REDACTED.pdf

Sole Source (Including Brand Name) Justification - Simplified Procedures for Certain Commercial Items

FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY

25 May 2018 FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Page 2 of 4

I. Contracting Activity.

This justification is executed by the United States Air Force Academy. The contracting agency for this request is 10 CONS/PKC located at the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA).

II. Nature and/or description of the action being processed.

The action being requested is a sole source acquisition for Merlin Products Limited- MP525 to the latest specification, the Government intends to procure this requirement through other than full and open competition IAW 41 U.S.C. 1901(e).

The CO notified USAFA/DF of the prohibition in DFARS 237.102-71(c) of acquiring flight simulators. The acquisition strategy is to purchase the simulators as a commodity rather than a service, which against there is no prohibition. FAR Part 12 and Subpart 13.5 procedures will be used and a new firm fixed price contract will be awarded.

III. Description of supplies/services required to meet agency needs.

This Justification and Approval (J&A) is an individual J&A for a new acquisition to award a firm fixed price (FFP) contract to purchase two (2) commercially available full-motion, engineering flight simulators. Currently, Merlin Products Limited is the only vendor in the world who offers a commercial, two-seat, reconfigurable, full-motion engineering flight simulator with COTS software which meets all the requirements of the Department of Aeronautics (DFAN).

To meet USAFA's strategic goal of producing highly educated and trained officers through a premier curriculum, the Department of Aeronautics requires two (2) highly specialized engineering (academic) flight simulators. These flight simulators are commercially available products with a completely open design. A student may create and modify his/her own aircraft for the specific purposes of understanding the physical effects of the equations and variables that are used in the build-up of an aircraft design process.

Accordingly, the flight simulators must be capable of simulating a wide variety of aircraft (such as fixed-wing, rotary wing, V/STOL, aerostats, etc), propulsion models (such as turbojet and turboprop), and vehicle customizations (such as payloads, aeroelastic compliance, and various control surfaces). The software must support live tuning of the aircraft parameters in real-time to investigate and demonstrate the stability of the aircraft to the student. For a premier student experience, the simulators must also replicate the full six-axis motion of the aircraft in flight.

The critical requirements are:

1) a two-seat, side-by-side, cockpit configuration with enclosed flight compartment mounted on a full six-axis motion system

2) cockpit heads down instruments displays consisting of ASI, ALT, AI, DI, ROC, Turn and Slip

3) COTS software supporting a fully nonlinear, transonic, real time, 6DOF simulation of fully reconfigurable aircraft including variation of the aircraft vehicle type, engine type, payload deployment, and control system mapping-

4) a built in GUI Editor for entry of student aircraft data, with a standalone application that can be provided to students

5) a control station which allows control of the simulator including power up, motion operations, and pilot monitoring

6) tuning of the aircraft stability derivatives or parameters

7) two side control sticks with digital force feedback with adjustable friction, dead bands, stops, and damping functions

8) integration with external applications to modify the simulation in real time

9) hardware fail safe systems and safety interlocks for the protection of personnel

10) full off-the-shelf compatibility with the annual "IT FLIES" student design competition.

11) one year of customer support, board replacements, and maintenance checks/updates

12) delivery, setup, and installation of the system to include a 2-day training course for DFAN personnel The type of contract planned is a FFP contract.

IV. Statutory authority permitting other than full and open competition.

41 USC 1901(e)

Sole Source (Including Brand Name) Justification - Simplified Procedures for Certain Commercial Items

25 May 2018 FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Page 3 of 4

V. Demonstration that the contractor's unique qualifications or nature of the acquisition requires the use of the authority cited above (applicability of authority).

The current flight simulator marketplace can be divided into three categories: 1) low-fidelity entertainment systems (for example, systems based on Microsoft Flight Simulator or XPlane), 2) high-fidelity simulation systems used for flight training and crew qualification, and 3) high-fidelity reconfigurable systems for the purpose of aeronautical engineering instruction and research.

The system required in the current acquisition is in the third category, which eliminates almost all flight simulation vendors. Furthermore, the system required must replicate the full motion of the aircraft in flight and provide several other highly-specialized features to meet DFAN's requirements. Merlin Products Limited is currently the only vendor in the world offering this highly-specialized product (a full-motion, high-fidelity flight simulator in the third category).

Therefore, this acquisition will procure this highly-specialized product from the only known vendor who can meet this requirement.

Award to any other source would result in substantial duplication of cost to the government that is not expected to be recovered through competition. First, another vendor would have to acquire the training and expertise in academic flight simulation. There would be considerable software development required for that vendor to support the wide range of vehicle types and customizations required. Software development would also have to be conducted to allow for the realtime tuning of the aircraft parameters in flight and for the creation of a graphical user interface for students to create their custom aircraft. Finally, this software development would have to be combined with the hardware required for full replication of the aircraft motion and digital force feedback through the control sticks. Considerable software and hardware development would be required to resolve the interfaces between the software and hardware. It took Merlin Products Limited over 20 years to develop and refine these capabilities and interfaces. Allowing for a team of engineers to develop this capability over 5 years would result in approximately in manpower costs alone, not including the hardware costs. (These costs were obtained by taking a typical engineering hourly rate and multiplying by the number of engineers and years of effort). Furthermore, this development would not meet the current requirement for a commercially available product. To recover these costs through competition, a significant number of these highly-specialized flight simulators would have to be acquired over an extended period of time. The Air Force Academy has no plans or requirements to procure additional flight simulators beyond the two discussed in the current acquisition.

Accordingly, Merlin Products Limited is the only vendor capable of providing the system described in Section III above without the U.S. Air Force experiencing substantial duplication of cost that could not be expected to be recovered through competition.

VI. Description of efforts made to ensure that offers are solicited from as many potential sources as practicable.

Research was conducted over a 2-year period starting in Aug 2016 on potential companies who could meet this need. Site visits were conducted to other universities and it was found that Merlin Products Limited was the only supplier of highfidelity, full-motion academic simulators for other universities.

A sources sought (FA700019R0006) was posted to FedBizOps on 16 Oct 2018 with a closing date of 24 Oct 2018. The intent of the brand name or equal sources sought was to validate the conclusion from the initial research was correct, and indeed Merlin was the only vendor that could meet the salient characteristics. In an effort to assist with that determination, the sources sought included a list of twelve salient characteristics for the requirement. No responses were received. This reinforced the previous conclusion that Merlin is the only vendor available to meet the governments requirement.

VII. Determination by the Contracting Officer that the anticipated cost to the Government will be fair and reasonable.

Purchase will be made as a Sole Source directly to Merlin Products Limited after determining that there are no active exclusions on sam.gov or Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System (FAPIIS). Supplies offered will be accepted on a fixed price basis. The Contracting Officer will determine the simulators to be priced fair and reasonable in accordance with FAR 13.106-3. Since only one response is anticipated the Contracting Officer will utilize Comparison of the proposed price with prices found reasonable on similar, previous purchases and with past invoices from Merlin.

Sole Source (Including Brand Name) Justification - Simplified Procedures for Certain Commercial Items

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VIII. Description of the market research conducted and the results, or a statement of the reasons market research was not conducted.

Market Research found that the requirement is commercially available. Merlin Products Limited was contacted in an effort to locate additional resellers capable of providing the Merlin MP525 Simulator. However, it was found Merlin is the only vendor capable of providing the system and all of the requested salient characteristics.

A search of GSA found no "Merlin Flight Simulators", and extensive market research discovered a total of 41 US and foreign companies who sell flight simulation products to commercial and government entities; however, of the 41 companies, only Merlin was found to meet all of the salient characteristics.

Only Merlin Products Limited offers a commercially available simulator which can simulate the wide variety of aircraft required and replicate the full motion of the aircraft. Thus, only Merlin Products Limited can meet the government requirements of this acquisition.

IX. Any other facts supporting the use of Other Than Full and Open Competition.

N/A

X. List of any sources that expressed, in writing, an interest in the acquisition.

Merlin Products Limited is the only authorized reseller of the sole source requirement.

XI. A statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers to competition before making subsequent acquisitions for the supplies or services required.

This is a one-time buy which involves the need for a product that is only available from one source. There are no subsequent acquisitions planned for this type of highly-specialized flight simulator. Since the Air Force Academy has no plans or requirements beyond the two flight simulators currently being acquired, no actions are planned to remove or overcome barriers to competition. Due to limited availability and market restrictions, options for future awards may also be restricted, however, should another potential source emerge, it will be assessed to determine whether competition is feasible.

XII. Certification by the Contracting Officer.

As evidenced by my signature above, I have determined this document to be both accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

XIII. Certification by the technical/requirements personnel.

As evidenced by my signature above, I certify that any supporting data contained herein, which is my (our) responsibility, is both accurate and complete.