Questions 139-154.doc

Q-139: According to the RFP, Amendment 0006, Page 26 (cited below) "The demonstration will utilize commercial internet service and test the /complete functionality of all components and capabilities of the integrated solution /utilizing the vendor’s test plan."

Where is the "other end" of the test to be conducted from?

A-139: PWS 2.1.8 defines the DEMARC for the vendor solution. Attachment 3 shows the anticipated test environment for the OCD. Both endpoints are indicated in the diagram.

Q-140: Does the statement "within 30 days of the proposal due date" apply to the notification date or is it anticipated that if an Offerer gets the call, they need to be ready for the OCD in less than a week?

A-140: They need to be ready for the OCD in the time clearly stated in the RFP, within 30 days of the proposal due date.

Q-141: Section 2.1.7.2 of the PWS states "VPN shall utilize Internet Protocol Security (IPSEC) and the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) with a key size of 256 bits, or later encryption standard."

a) Has DISA received approval from the US Department of State and US Department of Commerce to export 256 Encryption abroad?

b) It is our understanding that some of the countries on the list are restricted from having certain technologies exported to them or, given that the Commissaries are mostly on Military installations, DISA is exempt from the restrictions.

A-141: Question was not asked in time for sufficient research to be completed prior to posting.

Q-142: Is there a specific budget for this contract? If so, we would appreciate it if you would promulgate same.

A-142: We will not be disclosing any budgetary information.

Q-143. Given the huge amounts of changes that have been incorporated in these revised proposal documents, we request that the date for submission be Wednesday, June 4th.

A-143. Vendors were given the opportunity to have all their concerns and questions answered at the Pre-Proposal conference. Any changes or clarifications after the conference only simplified the requirements, and since this has been on the street for 60 days by proposal due date, no further extensions will be granted. As the cut off date for questions has passed, these have been answered as a courtesy, but no further questions will be posted prior to proposal due date of 28 May.

Q-144. RFP Amendment 0006, Page 24/41 Part III: “Technical Proposal: There is a new phrase stating “The technical/management proposal shall be formatted exactly as presented below for ease of correlation. Technical proposal must be sanitized, i.e., :no vendor/company names or logo permitted. Any tech proposal submitted that is not sanitized will not be evaluated.” Please clarify the intention here. Does this mean that the prime is referred to generically as “prime contractor” rather than “ABC, Inc.”? Also confirm that any names of vendors/subcontractors/products used by the prime contract CAN be called out and described in the Technical proposal such as “Cisco Router” or “HughesNet services”

A-144. Technical proposals SHALL NOT have the name of the company who is submitting the proposal scattered throughout the volume. It would be difficult to evaluate a technical proposal without having the products/equipment listed in it.

Q-145. For the OCD TestPlan, what are the DeCA’s pass/fail criteria for each item?

A-145. Refer to revised Sub-factor 5 in the RFP.

Q-146. Referring to PWS 2.3, it is stated that the maximum antenna size for roof installation is 1.5 meters. Should an antenna be required with a diameter larger than 1.5 meters, where does DeCA suggest that the antenna be placed since mounting on the building’s side is prohibited?

A-146. We are not VSAT engineers so dish installation is not our area of expertise. The last sentence in PWS 2.3.1.1 says, “DeCA's facility engineering team will assist in providing specific recommendations where possible”. Please note that bases may not accept large dishes in a visible area so screen fences/walls are likely to be required by many local installation architectural guidelines.

Q-147. PWS 2.3.2 What is a "standard install"? Please define this term.

A-147. An installation configuration proposed by the vendor and pre-approved by the government for use as a standard configuration. This will be defined after contract award as part of the contract initiation process.

Q-148. PWS 2.3.3 How can the vendor provide all site documentation including PCI Certification within 30 days of installation when as a response to a question the govt. allowed 30 days for PCI Certification alone?

A-148. PCI certification and the rest of the final documentation are not mutually exclusive efforts.

Q-149. PWS Section 2.1.11 - Deployable Vsat Suites -- we understand deploying a Suite for extended IP outages. However, "in support of case lot or parking lot sales" The mobile Vsat Suites have to be configured to support the mission and will not directly support POS equipment. What equipment we will be connecting to in order to support POS transactions?

A-149. PWS 2.1.8 defines the connection points or DEMARCs. The deployable locations will look like a store.

Q-150. PWS 1.1 – The requirement for “reasonable cost” has been removed. Is this correct?

A-150. Refer to the revised PWS, dated May 20, 2008.

Q-151. Given that this is an IDIQ contract, how should the terrestrial portions (from DeCA points to the teleports) be sized and priced? For instance the only guarantee is for the pilot sites which would require significantly less terrestrial bandwidth than a full deployment.

A-151. PWS 2.1.6.1, last sentence: “The IPGW links shall be sized by the Contractor sufficient to meet projected operational requirements based on the information supplied in this PWS and its associated attachments.”

Q-152. PWS 2.1.5 The Contractor shall provide a 99.7% uptime for all installed Broadband/VSAT service and the terrestrial Internet Protocol Gateway (IPGW) links to DeCA. This appears to be requirement of a combined service. If Broadband or VSAT is not available at a particular site, what is the required availability?

A-152. PWS 2.1.5 defines the requirement. PWS 2.1.5.1, last sentence says “ If a site has only one of the integrated components installed and operational due to non-availability of the other, downtime will commence when the installed component is not available and capable.” The uptime requirement does not change.

Q-153. The answer to Question 123 says the PWS will be updated with the CIR and Burst information for VSAT so a proper oversubscription pool can be designed. However the PWS does not seem to be updated with this information. Please provide it for us.

A-153. The answer to Q123 says, “See revised PWS.” in response to a question about 2.1.4. The last 3 sentences to 2.1.4 were added and explain that the Burst/CIR references are to frame relay. The Terrestrial, Burst and VSAT requirements were specified per site requirements. There are no burst requirements specified for the VSAT in this context. The only other bandwidth requirement is the multicast as specified in PWS 2.1.2 Q-154. The MRC pricing CLIN for VSAT BW states “TBD” for Quantity. Given that the oversubscription pool will be designed for all sites (Small, Medium and Large) in a given region, it is unclear how the BW CLIN is supposed to be priced as the order quantity can be as small as 1.

A-154. You must be referring to an earlier version of the pricing pages. The version posted with Amendment 0006 does not list “TBD” for quantity.