Section L Amendment 002.pdf

Jan 10, 2024

SECTION L

INSTRUCTIONS, CONDITIONS, AND NOTICES TO OFFERORS OR RESPONDENTS

1. OVERVEIW

1.1 - Program Information

The Thailand AT-6 program directly supports the delivery of eight (8) AT-6 aircraft and components to the Royal Thailand Air Force (RTAF) as a Building Partner Capacity (BPC) program. This program is a key component to ensuring expanding U.S. joint force interoperability with the RTAF. The main program objective is to provide this equipment to increase operational access to geographically important airfields, allowing for the agile employment of U.S. aircraft and equipment during contingencies in support of Thailand. This program will provide specific defense articles as specified in the Bill of Materials (BOM), with no exceptions or deviations, to the RTAF.

1.2 – General Instructions and Information

The offeror's proposal must include all data and information requested by these Instructions to Offerors (ITO) and must be submitted in accordance with these instructions. The proposal shall be compliant with the requirements as stated in the Statement of Work (SOW), Bill of Materials, Contract Data Requirements List (CDRL), and Request for Proposal (RFP)/Model Contract.

Non-conformance with the instructions provided in this ITO may result in an unfavorable proposal evaluation.

The proposal shall be clear, concise, and shall include sufficient detail for effective evaluation and for substantiating the validity of stated claims. The proposal should not simply rephrase or restate the Government's requirements but, rather, shall provide convincing rationale to address how the offeror intends to meet these requirements. Offerors shall assume that the Government has no prior knowledge of their facilities or experience and will base its evaluation on the information presented in the offeror's proposal.

Elaborate brochures or documentation, binding, detailed artwork, or other embellishments are unnecessary and are not desired.

The proposal acceptance period is specified in Section A of the model contract/solicitation. The offeror shall make a clear statement in Section A of the proposal documentation volume that the proposal is valid through this date.

In accordance with FAR Subpart 4.8 (Government Contract Files), the Government will retain one copy of all unsuccessful proposals. The Government will destroy extra copies of such unsuccessful proposals.

1.3 – Points of Contact

The Contracting Officer (CO), Nick A. Costides, nicholas.costides@us.af.mil and the Contract Specialist, Mr. Richard Goode, richard.goode.6@us.af.mil are the sole points of mailto:nicholas.costides@us.af.mil contact for this acquisition. Address any questions or concerns you may have to the CO or Specialist. Written requests for clarification may be sent to the CO at the address located in Section A of the model contract/solicitation. Any questions shall be submitted within 14 days of the RFP release date. Answers to any such questions/clarifications will be provided on the System for Award Management website at https://www.sam.gov and/or via RFP amendment. In the event of conflict between the answer to questions/clarifications and the RFP, the RFP shall take precedence.

1.4 – Debriefing

The CO will promptly notify offerors of any decision to exclude them from the competitive range; whereupon, they may request and receive a debriefing in accordance with FAR 15.505.

Offerors excluded from the competitive range may request a pre-award debriefing or they may choose to wait until after the source selection decision to request a post-award debriefing.

However, offerors excluded from the competitive range are entitled to no more than one debriefing. The CO will notify unsuccessful offerors in the competitive range of the source selection decision in accordance with FAR 15.506. Upon such notification, unsuccessful offerors may request and receive a debriefing. Offerors desiring a debriefing must make their request in accordance with the requirements of FAR 15.505 or 15.506, as applicable.

1.5 – Discrepancies

If an offeror believes that the requirements in these instructions contain an error, omission, or are otherwise unsound, the offeror shall immediately notify the CO in writing with supporting rationale as well as the remedies the offeror is asking the CO to consider as related to the omission or error. Electronic submittal of such notification is allowable.

1.6 - Electronic Reference Documents

All referenced documents for this solicitation are available on SAM.gov. Potential offerors are encouraged to subscribe for real-time e-mail notifications when information has been posted to the website for this solicitation.

1.7 - Communications

Exchanges of source selection information between Government and offerors will be controlled by the CO. Email may be used to transmit such information to offerors only if the email can be sent and received encrypted and includes “Source Selection Information – See FAR 2.101 & 3.104” in the Subject line. Otherwise, source selection information will be transmitted via DoD Secure Access File Exchange (SAFE) file sharing website, <https://safe.apps.mil/>. In order to facilitate the sending and receiving of encrypted emails, offerors must use MS Outlook email configured to support encryption or a different email product that is S/MIME compatible and configured to support encryption. If you intend to submit source selection information via encrypted email, you will need to contact the Contracting Officer indicated on the face page of http://www.sam.gov/ http://www.sam.gov/ the solicitation prior to that first submittal in order to exchange Public PKI key credentials. To ensure the process is working correctly, send a test encrypted message first (without including any source selection information)

2. PROPOSAL PREPERATION INSTRUCTIONS

2.1 – Organization/Number of Copies/Page Limits

The offeror shall prepare a fully digital proposal as set forth in the Proposal Organization Table (Table 1 below). The titles and contents of the volumes shall be as defined in this table. Font shall be 11.5-sized Times New Roman with 1-inch page margins. The contents of each proposal volume are described in the ITO paragraph as noted in the following table below:

Table 1 - Proposal Organization Table

VOLUME VOLUME TITLE

COPIES

(Digital Only) PAGE LIMIT

1 Executive Summary 1 3

2 Technical Proposal 1 N/A

3 Price Proposal 1 N/A

4 Model Contract Documentation 1 N/A

2.2 – Page Limitations

Page limitations shall be treated as maximums. If exceeded, the excess pages will not be read or considered in the evaluation of the proposal. Page limitations may be placed on responses to Evaluation Notices (ENs). The required contract set fourth in the gate criteria listed in section

4.5 of this document can be considered a separate attachment not subject to the page limitation in the technical volume. The specified page limits for EN responses will be identified in the letters forwarding the ENs to the offerors.

2.3 – Cross Referencing

To the greatest extent possible, each volume shall be written on a stand-alone basis so that its contents may be evaluated with a minimum of cross referencing to other volumes of the proposal. Information required for proposal evaluation which is not found in its designated volume will be assumed to have been omitted from the proposal. Cross-referencing within a proposal volume is permitted where its use would conserve space without impairing clarity.

2.4 – Indexing

Each volume shall contain a more detailed table of contents to delineate the subparagraphs within that volume. Table of contents will not count toward any page limitations. Tab indexing may be used to identify sections and if used will not be included in page limitations. If used, index pages should be blank and not be used to convey any information

2.5 – Electronic Offers

Offerors are required to provide a complete and viewable digital copy transmitted via DoDSAFE.

Proposals may include both PDFs and Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoints documents that can be sent and viewed electronically by the Government. Proposals shall be submitted no later than (45 days).

2.6 – Distribution

The "original" proposal shall be identified. The offeror’s proposal shall be prepared and submitted digitally in four volumes: Executive Summary (Volume 1), Technical Proposal (Volume 2), Price Proposal (Volume 3), and Model Contract Documentation (Volume 4). Proposals shall be addressed to the CO.

3. VOLUME 1, EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

In the Executive Summary volume, the offeror shall provide a narrative summary. The narrative summary of the entire proposal should be concise and highlight any key or unique features, excluding price. The salient features should tie in with Section M evaluation factors/sub-factors. Any summary material presented here shall not be considered as meeting the requirements for any portions of other volumes of the proposal.

4. VOLUME 2, TECHNICAL VOLUME

4.1 – General

The Technical Volume should be specific and complete. Legibility, clarity, and coherence are very important. Your responses will be evaluated against the Technical subfactors defined in Section M, Evaluation Factors for Award. Using the instructions provided below, provide as specifically as possible the actual methodology you would use for accomplishing/satisfying these subfactors. All the requirements specified in the solicitation are mandatory. By your proposal submission, you are representing that your firm will perform all the requirements specified in the solicitation. It is not necessary or desirable for you to tell us so in your proposal. Do not merely reiterate the objectives or reformulate the requirements specified in the solicitation (except for the specific name brand required part numbers).

4.2 - Format and Specific Content

Technical Capability shall be addressed in the Technical Proposal Volume. In this volume, address your proposed approach to meeting the requirements of each Technical subfactor.

4.3 - Technical

In the Technical Volume, address your technical solution for meeting the Government’s performance or capability requirements of each technical subfactor.

4.4 - Volume Organization

The Technical Volume shall be organized according to the following general outline:

1 Table of Contents

2 List of Tables and Drawings

3 Glossary

4 Gate Criteria

5 Factor One: Technical

5A. Bill of Material Compliance

5B. Delivery Schedule Approach

4.5 - Entry Gate: Relevant Performance History

In order to submit a proposal that is considered and evaluated, the offeror must provide evidence that they meet the following PASS/FAIL Gate Criteria. If the offeror cannot meet these criteria, the proposal will not be evaluated. The entry gate is passed when the proposal provides evidence that they have completed the following two criteria within a single contract:

A. A prior contract greater than $5M in total value within the past five calendar years of submission date and

B. International delivery of components outside of North America.

The offeror shall provide an executed contract as evidence. The offeror shall highlight the contract number, total contract value, period of performance, delivery locations, delivery dates, total value of items delivered, customer, and CO Information. The contractor shall redact/omit any classified or sensitive information. This contract should be submitted as an attachment to the Technical volume. IF AN OFFEROR FAILS TO PROVIDE

EVIDENCE OF THE ABOVE, THE OFFEROR WILL BE CONSIDERED

INELIGIBLE FOR CONTRACT AWARD AND ELIMINATED WITHOUT

FURTHER EVALUATION OF ITS PROPOSAL

4.6 – Factor 1, Technical

A. Subfactor One – Bill of Materials (BOM) Compliance

In order to address the measure of merit, the proposal shall include a brief description of the intended process the offeror will take to ensure compliance to the BOM. At a minimum, the description should include:

• For each item on the BOM, include the source from which the offeror intends to procure the parts, i.e., Company name

• A description of what the offeror has done to ensure they are able to obtain each part as listed on the BOM, e.g. Requested/received a valid quote from the source intended to procure from, with dates of availability

• The contractor will include with the proposals documents, copies of any/all quotes received from any vendors

• A statement of assurance/confirmation that the part number quoted to the offeror by the intended source will be the same for each item as listed on the BOM

B. Subfactor Two –Delivery Schedule Approach

In order to address the measure of merit, the proposal shall include a delivery schedule which includes the following elements:

• Line-item detail by components/accessories

• Proposed date of procurement

• Proposed date of shipment

• Proposed date of delivery

• Proposed method of shipment

• Confirmation that a Certificate of Conformance (COC) will be provided for each part

• Identification of packaging, handling, marking and transportation standards will be adhered to for shipment (i.e., MIL-STD-129, MIL-STD-2073-1 or other commercial equivalent).

5. VOLUME 3, PRICE VOLUME

5.1 General Instructions and Information -

Contractors shall use the Government-provided Excel file (Attachment 1, BOM and Pricing Matrix) to show their pricing including the Total Evaluated Price utilizing the instructions provided. This Excel document will become an attachment to the contract at the time of award.

This section is to assist you in submitting other than certified cost and pricing data that is required to evaluate the reasonableness, completeness, and unbalanced pricing of your proposal. Compliance with these requirements is mandatory and failure to comply may result in rejection of the proposal.

Offers should be sufficiently detailed to demonstrate their reasonableness and balance.

The burden of proof for credibility of proposed prices rests with the offeror.

5.2 Price Data -

Data beyond that required by this instruction shall not be submitted, unless you consider it essential to document or support your price position. All data relating to the proposed price, including all required supporting documentation, must be included in the section of the proposal designated as the Price volume. Under no circumstances shall this data and documentation be included elsewhere in the proposal.

5.3 Cost or Pricing Data Requirements -

The CO has determined there is a high probability of adequate price competition in this acquisition. Upon examination of the initial offers, the CO will review this determination and if, in the CO’s opinion, adequate price competition exists, no additional cost information will be requested, and certification under FAR 15.406-2 will not be required. In accordance with FAR 15.403-1(b) and 15.403-3(a), information other than cost or pricing data may be required to support price reasonableness. Information shall be provided IAW FAR 15.403-5.

If, after receipt of proposals, the CO determines that there is insufficient information available to determine price reasonableness, and none of the exceptions in FAR 15.403-1 apply, the Offeror shall be required to submit cost or pricing data.

5.4 Volume Organization -

The price volume shall consists of the following sections:

• Section 1: Bill of Materials and Pricing Matrix

• Section 2: Other than certified cost or pricing data, to include estimating methodology.

• Section 3: Other information deemed pertinent with explanations. List each exception to the ground rules and assumptions provided in the solicitation and each qualification of the Price volume, if any. Provide complete rationale for any exceptions.

5.5 Total Evaluated Price (TEP) Instructions -

The Offeror shall complete Attachment 1, BOM and Pricing Matrix, to demonstrate their proposed pricing rounding to the second decimal place. Offerors shall use the instructions below which are also located on the Pricing Matrix Instructions Tab to insert proposed prices in the Pricing Matrix Tab:

a) CLIN 0001 - COMMON MULTI-BAND DATALINK (CMDL2x) AIRCRAFT TRANSCEIVER - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

b) CLIN 0002 – REMOTELY OPERATED VIDEO ENHANCED RECEIVER (ROVER) - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

c) CLIN 0003 - HMP-400 Gun Pod & .50 Cal Gun - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell

d) CLIN 0004 - .50 CALIBER ALIGNMENT ROD – Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

e) CLIN 0005 - BORESIGHTING TELESCOPE - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

f) CLIN 0006 - TEST BOX UNIT (TBU) - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

g) CLIN 0007 - BORESIGHT INSPECTION CHECK GAUGE - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

h) CLIN 0008 - HMP TOOLKIT - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

i) CLIN 0009 - M3P/HMP TOOL KIT FOR ARMOURER GSE - Enter the unit price on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

j) CLIN 0010 - TRANSPORTATION - The contractor shall insert the total price of transportation on the pricing matrix tab in the corresponding yellow cell.

The Total Evaluated Price will be automatically calculated in the green cell labeled “Total Evaluated Price.”

NOTE: Yellow cells represent unit price inputs required by the offeror in the Pricing Matrix Tab. Blue cells represent total prices, which will be automatically calculated by the formula.

Green cells, represent the offerors Total Evaluated price which will be automatically calculated by the formula.

6. VOLUME 4, CONTRACT DOCUMENTATION

6.1 Model Contract/Representations and Certifications -

The purpose of this volume is to provide information to the Government for preparing the contract document and supporting file. The offeror's proposal shall include a signed copy of the Model Contract including the applicable sections listed below.

6.2 Section A, Solicitation/Contract Form –

Completion of proposed pricing on the model contract shall be consistent with prices proposed in the Pricing Matrix. Signature by the offeror on the SF33 constitutes an offer, which the Government may accept.

6.3 Section B - Supplies or Services and Prices -

No special instructions. Do not enter prices into Section B, as they will not be evaluated.

Price evaluation will be accomplished via Section J, Attachment 1 – BOM and Pricing Matrix

6.4 Section G - Contract Administrative Data -

No special instructions.

6.5 Section H - Special Contract Requirements -

No special instructions

6.6 Section I - Contract Clauses -

The offeror shall complete any applicable fill-ins for Section I.

6.7 Section J – Attachments -

The offeror shall complete and/or provide the following as an attachment to the Model Contract (Section J):

• Subcontracting Plan

A. Subcontracting Plan - Participation of Small Businesses (SB), Historically Black Colleges and Universities, or Minority Institutions (HBCU/MI). Offerors shall submit a Small Business Subcontracting Plan (SBSP) in accordance with FAR 52.219-9 that also identifies and specifies the extent of offeror's commitment to the participation of small businesses (SB), historically black colleges or universities (HBCU) and minority institutions (MI), whether as joint venture members, teaming arrangement partners, or subcontractors. If applicable, submit a copy of an approved Master Plan. In the event the offeror has negotiated a comprehensive subcontracting plan pursuant to DFARS 219.702, the offeror must submit the information that identifies and specifies the extent of its commitment to the participation of SB, HBCU and MI. Proposed subcontracting plans will be evaluated by the contracting officer prior to acceptance in accordance with FAR Part 19, as supplemented.

6.8 Section K – Certifications, and other Statements of Offerors -

Offer must provide completed representations, certifications, acknowledgments and statements in System for Award Management (SAM) at www.sam.gov.

6.9 Exceptions to Solicitation Requirements -

Offerors are required to meet all solicitation requirements, such as terms and conditions, representations and certifications, and technical requirements, in addition to those identified as evaluation factors or subfactors. Offerors must clearly identify any exception to the solicitation terms and conditions and provide complete accompanying rationale.

Each exception shall be specifically related to each paragraph and/or specific part of the solicitation to which the exception is taken. Provide rationale in support of the exception and fully explain its impact, if any, on the performance, schedule, price, and specific requirements of the solicitation. This information shall be provided in the format and content of the table below:

Solicitation Exceptions

Solicitation Document

Page/ Paragraph

Requirement/ Portion Rationale

Model Contract, Bill of Materials, Pricing Matrix, SOW, etc..

Applicable Page and Paragraph Numbers

Identify the requirement or portion to which exception is taken

Describe why the requirement can/will not be met

6.10 Other Information Required -

A. Authorized Offeror Personnel: Provide the name, title, and telephone number of the company/division point of contact regarding decisions made with respect to your proposal and who can obligate your company contractually. Also, identify those individuals authorized to negotiate with the Government. As well as the name and title of the CEO, Division President, and/or Vice President.

B. Company/Division Address, Identifying Codes, and Applicable Designations: Provide company/division's street address, county and facility code; CAGE code; DUNS code; TIN; size of business (large or small); and labor surplus area designation. This same information must be provided if the work for this contract will be performed at any other location(s). List all locations where work is to be performed and indicate whether such facility is a division, affiliate, or subcontractor, and the percentage of work to be performed at each location.

C. List of Attachments: Section L attachments listed below are provided as separate files.

• Attachment 1: Bill of Materials and Pricing Matrix

• Attachment 2: Statement of Work (SOW)

• Attachment 3: CDRLS

• Attachment 4: Model Contract