JA MongoDB Redacted.pdf

MongoDB Licensing and Maintenance CONTROL NUMBER VA-26-00010295

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 delivery order issued under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solution for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Government-Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for brand name MongoDB software licenses, support maintenance and training.

3. Description of the Supplies or Services: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Office of Information and Technology (OI&T), Data Access Services (DAS) has a requirement for brand name MongoDB database software licenses. This proposed action is to renew three MongoDB Enterprise Advanced (EA) licenses, including maintenance to provide software updates, patches and bug fixes with optional tasks for MongoDB Atlas licenses, additional MongoDB EA licenses and training.

VA requires a document-oriented NoSQL database designed to handle unstructured and semi-structured data that can process files exceeding 100MB. MongoDB EA uses a document model where data is stored in JavaScript Object Notation like documents, with customizable fields, structures and data models. This flexibility is critical for the DAS system to support the variety of data types and formats including payload size, data structure and content associated with the 26+ active dataflows in Production and future-proof DAS by supporting expansion of additional dataflows as demands require.

MongoDB EA enforces end-to-end security by encrypting data at rest, in transit and in use. This combination of security is critical to the DAS system, an OI&T High Value Asset system and Critical100 system, assessed at a High Confidentiality/High Integrity/High Availability/High Impact security categorization. MongoDB EA is cloud-agnostic which supports the DAS multi-cloud deployment model in both AWS and Azure.

In addition, VA has a need for a cloud optimized, centrally managed NoSQL database including all the functionality and security of MongoDB EA but offered as Software-as-a- Service [SaaS]. MongoDB Atlas, a cloud optimized centrally managed NoSQL database, automates administrative tasks such as major and minor versioning upgrades, patching, backups, provisioning and scaling. MongoDB’s SaaS benefits the government by ensuring security compliance and eliminating the cost of additional contractor resources. MongoDB Atlas is cloud-agnostic which supports the DAS multi-cloud deployment model in both AWS and Azure.

The DAS project intends to conduct rigorous testing of MongoDB Atlas in our lower environments, exploring its potential as a viable replacement for our existing MongoDB EA licenses. The period of performance will be a 12-month base period with two 12-month option periods and four optional tasks in the base period and option periods. In the option periods, MongoDB Atlas will be exercised as the base requirement replacing MongoDB EA. In addition, the option periods will have one optional task for additional MongoDB Atlas licenses and an optional task for MongoDB EA licenses. The remaining optional tasks include training subscriptions and public training courses. The total estimated value of the proposed action is which is inclusive of the option periods and optional tasks.

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: Based on market research, as described in Section 8 of this document, it was determined that limited competition is viable among resellers for the brand name MongoDB EA and Atlas software licenses, maintenance support services and training. These licenses service over 26 unique dataflows with varying levels of complexity, ranging from simple proxy services that still require in depth auditing capabilities, to intricate retrieval, storage, transformation and reporting flows. The size, structure, format and content of the files are variable, and routinely exceed 100MB. MongoDB can process files exceeding 100MB and accommodate these variations and associated customizations that are needed for data to be retrievable in a format that is usable to the partners on both ends of the flow.

These dataflows transport data between VA systems and connect externally to other government agencies and external vendors, mandating high security requirements which MongoDB EA is able to meet with their Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) high approval and Defense Information Systems Agency, Security Technical Implementation Guides (STIG) Security Compliance baselines.

Of the 26+ dataflows actively in production, the DAS system processes millions of transactions weekly for the Service Treatment Records (STR), Disability Benefits Questionnaires (DBQ), Community Care, and medical imagery dataflows (Artifact Exchange, Medical Imagery Exchange and Radiology). These dataflows include binary attachment payloads that routinely exceed 100MB. Failure to process STRs and DBQs will disrupt the continuity of services and negatively impact Veteran compensation and pension benefits. Failure to process medical imagery will disrupt the continuity of services and negatively impact Veteran healthcare.

In order to meet the heightened security requirements of a system that stores Veteran Personal Identifiable Information (PII) and Protected Health Information (PHI) which interfaces with multiple VA systems, as well as externally, MongoDB EA and Atlas provide end-to-end security with built-in security controls, encryption at rest and in transit and regular updates to patch any known vulnerabilities within 90 days. MongoDB Atlas is currently working with the FedRAMP agency to increase the accreditation of MongoDB Atlas from FedRAMP Moderate to High in FY26. Upon such accreditation the DAS system intends to expand use of MongoDB Atlas into the production environment.

MongoDB EA and Atlas are cloud agnostic, allowing DAS to support a multi-cloud presence and facilitate communications between partners hosted on site, in VAEC Amazon Web Services and VAEC Azure. No other brand name database software can provide this set of capabilities. Additionally, no other brand name software is compatible or interoperable with the current infrastructure.

The impact to partner systems and partner data, including DoD, Oracle Health, Community Care providers, and other external agencies connected to VA through DAS, must be considered. These partners depend on large, variable, and high-volume transactions that must be delivered securely and in real time. MongoDB was found to be capable of sustaining these exchanges without service degradation, ensuring VA remains compliant with statutory requirements for inter-agency interoperability under the 21st Century Cures Act and TEFCA.

If VA were to migrate to a new alternate database product, it would require engagement of the 5 scrum teams that support MongoDB and the dataflows, as well as a Build and Release scrum team and a Software Architect Services scrum team to migrate existing data, refactor code, rebuild services, and revalidate every data flow. The schedule to complete these activities is 12 months, during which, VA would be unable to support active data flows in production including STRs, DBQs, Community Care referrals. Such a disruption would delay disability adjudication under the PACT Act, break Community Care access under the MISSION Act, and stall compliance with the Cures Act’s interoperability mandates. The estimated cost of moving to an alternate database solution is estimated at $3,590,035.56. Based on market research it is anticipated that these estimated costs will not be recovered through competition.

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 could meet the Government’s requirements. However, the undersigned VA technical representative determined that limited competition is available among authorized resellers for brand name MongoDB licenses, as well as supporting maintenance and training. In accordance with FAR 16.505(a)(4)(iii)(A)(1), this justification will be provided with the solicitation to all appropriate NASA SEWP V GWAC holders. Furthermore, in accordance with FAR 5.301, 16.505(b)(2)(ii)(D), and 16.505(a)(4)(iii), the award notice for this action will be synopsized on the Contract Opportunities website 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: VA technical experts conducted market research in February through March 2025 of potential database products including Couchbase, MarkLogic, AWS DocumentDB, and DynamoDB. Each of these solutions fail to meet the government requirement to process large file sizes. DAS dataflows regularly process files over 100 MB, particularly STRs, DBQs, and medical imagery, and often into the gigabyte range for radiology and genomic research. These payloads are essential to VA compliance statutes. Couchbase cannot support payloads over 24 MB; MarkLogic requires special handling for files above 1 MB; and both AWS DocumentDB and DynamoDB are optimized for high-volume transactions of small files, which are limited to 16MB and 0.4MB respectively.

Additionally, the technical team posted a Request for Information through the NASA SEWP tool for the MongoDB EA and Atlas line items identified as critical to continuity of services. Eight vendors provided responses, which all proposed MongoDB EA and Atlas producers that meet all the requirements for this effort.

Further market research was conducted by the Contract Specialist in October 2025 utilizing the Provider Look Up Tool on the NASA SEWP V GWAC website, which identified multiple Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Businesses (SDVOSBs) Value Added Reseller GWAC holders that provide brand name MongoDB products. Therefore, limited competition is expected among SDVOSBs for this proposed action.

9. Other Facts: N/A

Technical/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.

Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination

I hereby determine that the anticipated price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable based on anticipated competition and discounts among multiple Value-added resellers of the required brand name MongoDB products described herein. Additionally, further price analysis of quotes received will be conducted to determine a fair and reasonable price. Finally, pricing of products awarded under NASA SEWP V GWAC have already been determined to be fair and reasonable.

Contracting Officer Certification/Approval

I certify that this justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Approval

In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of brand name MongoDB software licenses, supporting maintenance and training on an other than fair opportunity basis pursuant to the 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.