JA_Collibra_Final - JB-S.pdf

Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS, Support and Maintenance VA-24-00014319

JUSTIFICATION

FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

1. Contracting Activity: Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Procurement, Acquisition, and Logistics

Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way

Eatontown, NJ 07724

2. Description of Action: The proposed action is for a firm-fixed price (FFP) delivery order under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solutions for

Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for Brand Name Collibra Enterprise Platform software-as-a-service (SaaS), Support and Maintenance.

3. Description of Supplies or Services: VA Office of Information and Technology (OIT), DevSecOps (DSO), Data & Analytics (D&A) has a requirement for brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform software-as-a-service that is used to assist in data discovery and governance across a large enterprise organization. The solution will create a searchable inventory of existing metadata and datasets, generate new metadata to improve classification of data assets and facilitate governance thereof. The Health Data Analytics Platform (HDAP) customers will interact with the brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS through the Data Governance Center (DGC). The solution will allow data stewards and analysts to discover new data, analyze and understand its characteristics and relationships to other assets in the enterprise. Each data and metadata asset can also have a configurable status, a configurable set of data validation rules, and data quality assessments that can help ensure consistency and quality of enterprise metadata. Additionally, the solution will allow the sorting of assets into a nested hierarchy of containers which can be governed independently, highly configurable role-based access control and permissions matrix, allowing administrators to configure different permissions across different parts of an enterprise’s metadata.

Finally, the solution requires a configurable workflow engine, based on Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN), that can be used to trigger workflows as assets are created or changed, and that can automate various workflows as desired.

The solution shall provide a Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) (Moderate Impact Level) authorization for secure cloud deployments at government agencies and maintain VA a favorable Authority to Operate (ATO).

Additionally, the solution shall leverage industry standards for user-friendly web tools to develop customized workflows without the need for technical resources and follow open data lake/lakehouse architecture principles.

VA also requires premium support consisting of an annual subscription that provides a named support contact, enhanced service-level agreement, regularly scheduled support status reviews, and bi-annual service reviews; Resident Enterprise Architect to provide ongoing expert technical management; and training consisting of 200 Pre-Packed Education Credits that provide flexibility to choose training sessions and activities. The

Period of performance is a base period of twelve (12) months from the date of award, and two (2) 12-month option period. The total estimated value of the proposed action is $5,935,604.25 inclusive of all options.

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

5. Rationale Supporting Use of Authority Cited Above:

VA and the Department of Defense (DoD) Joint Executive Committee (JEC) developed the VA-DoD Joint Data and Analytics Strategy Plan of Action (as of July 2021) that seeks to implement joint data interoperability to reliably deliver the right information and services to improve the VA Member Experience when seeking benefits and services.

On August 10, 2022, the Sergeant First Class (SFC) Heath Robinson Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act was signed into law, further expanding VA health care and benefits to Veterans. The VA collaboration with the DoD requires interoperability between their systems to support the exchange of data products to improve the decision-making derived from interagency data assets for determining VA health care services and/or benefits.

In 2022, OIT D&A developed an interface with Brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS to supports VA customers like HDAP who utilize the suite of tools to meet the current business needs to improve outcomes for Veterans and their families through the use of data analytics tools. Collibra software was piloted, tested and demonstrated to work in the HDAP production and non-production environments for the past two years.

Numerous products have been built around Collibra such as the data catalog during this time period. Collibra currently provides all licenses, maintenance, and training needed to utilize their tool, and a technical team is available to support the VA end users.

Collibra provides a suite of tools that provides fully customizable and powerful workflows built into the core platform which VA uses to exchange data with the DoD.

For example, Collibra’s Data Lineage tool helps visualize accuracy of its data, how data transforms, where data is located and how it flows as it is transported from source to destination, and across its entire lifecycle. Collibra Data Lineage allows users to access detailed technical lineage to view transformations, drill down into table, column, and query-level lineage, and navigate through the data pipeline. Technical lineage diagrams are based on technical metadata that is automatically harvested from the source system. These diagrams focus on system-to-system lineage, including source-to-target mappings. These diagrams can also depict transformations, embedded logic, or stored procedures.

Collibra’s suite of products, licenses and maintenance support provides a unique solution that is compatible with the existing VA HDAP system and meets the current business needs for delivery of VA health care and benefits. In response to emergent events such as PACT act, Collibra directly supports surge capability to increase visibility for data quality and observability. The metadata tools within Collibra’s suite of products will also support the modernization and maturation of data interoperability between VA and the DoD.

Based on extensive market research, as described in Section 8 of this document, it was determined that brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS is the only solution that meets VA’s requirements. Any other solution would require the VA to redesign all current workflows and processes, and at this time, the level of effort (LOE) and timeline would result in at least $2,000,000.00 in labor costs and at least two years of that would not be recouped through competition. The HDAP enterprise data catalog has been built using Collibra and introducing a different solution would be a duplication of effort to validate and re-establish defective functionality in the production and non-production HDAP environments. A change in vendor and SaaS product would introduce other risks to the data catalog such as loss of data lineage and associated metadata related to the data assets, and require modifications modify any workflows and/or processes that do not follow the current technical lineage. Moreover, any change to architecture due to change in SaaS product would trigger a review of the System Security Plan (SSP) that is required to maintain ATO status and could impact availability of the data catalog if the outcome resulted in an unfavorable ATO designation. These impacts would also not be limited to internal VA processes but may also negatively impact the VA-DoD Joint Data and Analytics Strategy Plan of Action.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in Section 8 of this justification. This effort did not yield any additional sources that can meet the Government's requirements. However, the undersigned VA technical representative determined that limited competition is available among authorized resellers for brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS, as well as software maintenance and support. In accordance with FAR 6.302-1(c)(1)(ii)(c) and 5.102(a)(6) this justification shall be posted with the solicitation. Furthermore, the proposed action will be synopsized on the System for Award Management website (SAM.gov) and this justification will be made publicly available within 14 days of award.

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

8. Market Research: The Government’s technical experts conducted market research in January 2024 through a Request for Information (RFI), website research, and discussions. The RFI resulted with one reseller responding to the RFI and is identified as a Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SDVOSB). No other alternative brand name solution was proposed. No new products have become available that can meet all of VA’s functional requirements. The Government’s technical experts review of the following software products Alation Data Catalog, Alex Augmented Data Catalog, Ataccama Data Catalog, and Collibra. Moreover, the Alation Data Catalog product utilizes Structured Query Language (SQL) and it was further determined to not be capable of meeting the Government’s requirement that HDAP utilize open architected lake house architecture. Both Alex Augmented Data Catalog and Ataccama Data Catalog were also eliminated since they didn’t provide automated workflows. As a result of the market research, it was discovered that these products couldn’t meet all the requirements of the VA. Based on the Government’s market research, brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS is the only product that meets the Government’s requirements.

Additional market research was performed in February 2024 utilizing the NASA SEWP V GWAC Provider Lookup tool, which resulted in the identification of multiple verified

Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) resellers of the required brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS. As a result, there is a reasonable expectation for limited competition on the NASA SEWP V GWAC for the brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS.

9. Other Facts: None

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

Amberly Ferry Date: _____________________

IT Project Manager Signature: _______________________

11. Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable. Contracts awarded on NASA SEWP V GWAC have already been determined to be fair and reasonable. As there are multiple resellers on the NASA SEWP V GWAC capable of providing brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS, Support and Maintenance described herein, price competition is anticipated. Finally, if only one quote is received price analysis shall be conducted by comparing the successful quote to the Independent Government Cost Estimate.

Joseph Jones Date: ________________________________

Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: ____________________________

12. Procuring Contracting Officer Certification: I certify that this justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Joseph Jones Date: ________________________________

Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: ____________________________

Approval

In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of brand name Collibra Enterprise Platform SaaS, Support and Maintenance, on an other than fair opportunity basis pursuant to the statutory authority cited in Section 4 above, subject to availability of funds, and provided that the property and services herein described have otherwise been authorized for acquisition.

Jason Bullen Date Advocate for Competition

Technology Acquisition Center (003B2Y) Office of Procurement, Acquisition, and Logistics Department of Veteran Affairs