JA CONSERV Environmental System_Redacted.pdf

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY

JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL

FOR OTHER THAN FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION

1. Contracting Activity: The United States Army Contracting Command – Detroit Arsenal (ACC-DTA) is the procuring activity for this action.

2. Description of Action: ACC-DTA is proposing to solicit and award, on a sole source basis, a three-year Firm Fixed-Price (FFP) contract, consisting of a base and two option years, to Gaylord Archival to provide cloud-based environmental monitoring services through the Conserv Monitoring System, including central gateways and smart sensors. The proposed contractor information is below.

Gaylord Archival CAGE Code: 3KLF2 Unique Entity ID: LMQHS89J96K7 Address: 7282 William Barry Blvd, North Syracuse, NY 13212-3347, United States

The total estimated value of the proposed action, inclusive of options, is .

funds will be utilized for this effort. Appropriate year funds will be used to fund option years, if exercised.

3. Description of Services: This procurement is to support the Army Museum Enterprise (AME). AME requires an automated system to collect, analyze, and make available specific data related to the ambient environments that house and display Army Museum Property throughout 43 collection locations. The system shall collect and store temperature, relative humidity, and light exposure data in each sensor’s environment.

To meet the technical capabilities of all Army Museums, the chosen environmental monitoring system must function using non-wireless fidelity (WiFi) access to the internet; must function independently of the Department of Defense (DoD) local area network and any Army computer; and comply with Section 889 of the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) regarding covered telecommunications equipment or services. The Conserv Monitoring System, sold by Gaylord Archival, provides cloud-hosted service capabilities that permit AME professionals access to and analysis of the critical data that safeguards the preservation of Historic Army Material.

Conserv uses a Long-Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN), rather than WiFi or Bluetooth, to wirelessly connect monitoring sensors to the gateway, where data is uploaded to and accessible from the Conserv Cloud. The Conserv website offers the ability for any AME professional to collect, assess, analyze, and retrieve the environmental data from any location and at any time. Services include sensor recalibration, battery replacement, assistance for set-up and training, and access to a help line for support and troubleshooting.

Army Regulation (AR) 870-20, “Army Museum Enterprise and Army Artifact Collection” provides the regulatory guidance for all accountable Army historical property. Chapter 5, “Safeguard, Care, and Use of Army Artifacts” begins with a section on preserving the physical and chemical structure of this Army legacy. Maintaining a standard minimum and maximum for ambient temperature, relative humidity and exhibit light levels are clearly defined. The AME collection requires resources to understand the ambient environment where collections are stored and displayed. Conserv allows any collection museum and/or storage facility to access the specific data of individual locations, to run reports comparing datasets and to set alarms if set limits are compromised.

4. Authority Cited: The statutory authority permitting other than full and open competition is Title 41 U.S.C.1901 as implemented by Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 13.501(a), Sole Source Acquisitions, which authorizes the use of simplified procedures for the acquisition of supplies and services in amounts greater than the simplified acquisition threshold but not exceeding $7.5 million, including options, if the contracting officer reasonably expects, based on the nature of the supplies or services sought and on market research, that offers will include only commercial products or commercial services.

5. Reason for Authority Cited: Gaylord Archival maintains an exclusive distribution agreement with Conserv Solutions, Inc. and is the sole source distributor of the Conserv Monitoring System. There are no other dealers authorized to represent these environmental monitoring services. Conserv is the only commercially available program that offers a unique contactless data collection system via LoRaWAN that can interface with Conserv Cloud Solutions to provide services to 43 individual Army Museum collections. AME is aware of no other company offering this unique set of services in existence. While market research was conducted to determine availability of comparable programs, no other vendor service was available without either Bluetooth or WiFi as a mechanism to transfer data.

The AME has struggled to find one system that could be used on the enterprise-level.

The AME as a headquarters operation must maintain oversight of the data collected to ensure the acceptability of each museum environment per requirements of AR 870-20.

Not all AME museum collections have WiFi capabilities and AME is not able to provide and accommodate WiFi for each location where Army Museum collections are stored.

Even if comprehensive WiFi was financially possible, some physical locales of the Enterprise physically cannot accommodate systems that utilize WiFi or Bluetooth as the technology because of the building type and construction materials.

Based on all research conducted to date, other systems are not an option for the varied locations of the AME. To procure this service using other vendors who require WiFi capture of sensors and interfacing with the cloud-based storage and software, the AME would need to invest in WiFi installation for collection storage buildings at the

AME sites. The estimate from AME Resource Manager for the installation of WiFi capabilities was per building, at minimum, based on variables like building construction materials, location, and provider availability. This would be a minimum investment of plus monthly/annual provider fees for service. This is not a viable option. Similarly, Bluetooth is not an option because overall cellular capability for the sensor locations in the broad variety of buildings is physically impossible without major building modifications. AME is a tenant of many of these historic buildings and cannot dictate any changes to these structures.

AME requires a standardized mode of environmental data delivery to efficiently assess the acceptability of each storage location, per AR 870-20. Using the Conserv cloud-based services, unlimited user access ability is the answer for supervisory-level managers at the headquarters level to monitor this information and take action to correct any building-related issues affecting the standard for museum environmental conditions. The estimate of time/cost savings per month using the Conserv automated contactless system is of staff time per sensor. This is based on physical data collection, manual up-loading, and equipment maintenance. Over one year for a site with loggers, the savings are hours of labor time at a cost of per hour. This saves one collection with sensors per year and for the sensors for all of AME, the savings is per year, which is more than the annual cost of the Conserv services and substantially less than outfitting all storage buildings with WiFi or Bluetooth capability.

This sole source vendor utilizes a separate, air locked, independent LoRaWAN technology to supply the museum industry standard environmental monitoring services.

As the Army Museum System continues to reorganize, we must gain intellectual control over our historical property storage environments. Failure to procure this system now will further jeopardize Army Historical Property by permitting unregulated, controlled, and uncontrolled environments to go unchecked.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition:

a. Effective Competition: The Government does not intend to solicit additional sources for this effort for the reasons described in Paragraph 5 above.

b. Subcontracting Competition: Pursuant to FAR 19.702(b)(1), a small business subcontracting plan is not required because Gaylord Archival is a small business.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: No actions to increase future competition are contemplated currently, as Gaylord Archival meets AME’s need to provide cloud-based environmental monitoring services. Since the LoRaWAN technology utilized by the Conserv Monitoring System is not proprietary, other companies may emerge as competitors for this service in the coming years. Prior to future solicitations, market research will be conducted to determine whether other firms provide non-WiFi or non- Bluetooth compatible programs for museum environmental monitoring.

8. Market Research: Pursuant to FAR 10.002 (Procedures), market research was conducted by the Contract Specialist, , the AME Chief Conservator, , and AME Museum Curator, , from December

2021 to February 2023. A Request for Information (RFI), consisting of 14 open-ended questions regarding wireless temperature and humidity data loggers, was posted on https://sam.gov/ in March 2022. vendors submitted responses consisting of different environmental monitoring systems or models. In May 2022, a follow-up list of 28 questions was sent to vendors that responded to the initial RFI. These questions related to topics such as data storage, reporting, security, calibration, and power/battery replacement. While there are several companies that offer the type of environmental monitoring services being requested, the Conserv Monitoring System is the only one that utilizes LoRaWAN technology and provides an alternative to WiFi or Bluetooth. In February 2023, Gaylord Archival provided documentation stating that it is the sole source distributor of the Conserv Monitoring System. Market research indicates that Gaylord Archival is the only vendor capable of fulfilling the Government’s need.

9. Interested Sources: To date, no other sources with a technological solution to address the AME’s unique needs have written to express an interest.

10. Other Facts: On a system-wide level, the AME has struggled for an all-encompassing solution that will work in every needed location. To date, individual museums of the AME have approached this need in a piecemeal fashion. In 2020, the National Museum of the United States Army (NMUSA) could not wait for an enterprise-wide solution and went with a WiFi-dependent system. This museum has the funding via

. That contract was for the purchase of a system that NMUSA must maintain, and NMUSA pays an annual subscription for this service. The Pratt Museum (Fort Campbell, KY) had a different WiFi-dependent system. This is not an enterprise solution. It is far too expensive for the AME to outfit every museum collection building with WiFi capabilities.

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

Typed Name: Date: 10 April 2023 Title: Chief Conservator Signature:

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

Typed Name: Date: 10 April 2023 Title: Chief Conservator Signature:

13. Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated cost to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable based on the Independent Government Cost Estimate (IGCE) and past procurement history. The contractor will not be required to submit certified cost and pricing data because the