JA_Simplified_New_Nikon_Instruments_rev.docx

JUSTIFICATION & APPROVAL

Below the Simplified Acquisition Threshold

Project Title: Division of Developmental Biology

A. Name and address of the proposed contractor(s) Enter the name and address of the proposed sole source contractor.

Nikon Instruments, Inc.

1300 Walt Whitman Road Melville, NY 11747

(632) 547-8542 www.nikoninstruments.com niiordersmar@nikon.net

B. Describe why only the requested supply/service will meet the government’s needs Provide a specific explanation of why we cannot purchase another product or service and this is the only one that will satisfy the governments need. This is not where you justify the specific vendor that we must use. It focuses only on the non-substitutable nature of the products or services you are requesting. If there are substitute products or services, then you must either demonstrate factually why they will not work, or the acquisition must be competed. This should be supported by verifiable facts rather than untested or unsubstantiated opinions or conclusions. For example, it should not include statements such as, “We have used this product (or this company) in the past and it works (or the company is reliable),” because that statement does not prove that other products wouldn’t also be viable options.

In cases where the product or service is sole source because it is a variable, ensure that is clear why the item is a variable and how changing it would compromise the integrity of the experiment. Keep in mind that if this is a new experiment (not yet started), then there are no current variables to compromise.

The Ti2 Inverted High Speed Widefield Microscope with Spinning Disk detection and NIS-Elements Software is new technology brought to the market by Nikon within the last two years. While there are other stereoscopes on the market produced by other companies, none of them have the capabilities of the Ti2 system or the NIS-Elements software that comes with it. The Nikon Ti2 inverted microscope has up to a 25 mm field of view, the largest field of view commercially available, up to twice as wide as many competitors. This makes the system optimal for imaging large samples like live zebrafish and large mouse sections. The Yokogowa CSU W1 spinning disk unit attached to the Ti2 offers extremely fast optical sectioning, many times faster than a point scanning confocal, and it is able to image over 200um deep into the sample due to its wider pinhole array. With the Hamimatsu Flash 4V3 camera, this system is able to acquire images at 2K X 2K resolution in microseconds, which no other microscope platform can currently do. Due to its unique capabilities, this microscope is in constant use by several of our labs for their research. Therefore, it is in the government’s best interest to keep this system functioning in peak condition to support their work.

C. Describe why only the proposed contractor is capable of providing the requested supply/service This is the section in which we discuss why only one vendor (source) can supply the non-substitutable product or service discussed in part B, above. Justify factually why only this vendor is qualified to offer the products. The most common justification is that the supply/service represents a unique capability that cannot be replicated in another product/service. Other examples include urgency, exclusive licensing agreements, brand-name or industrial mobilization. Please justify the sole source below. Do not include statements based on opinion or preference such as, “We always use this vendor and their quality is outstanding.” If the J&A is based on preference, the product or service will be competed.

As the developer of this proprietary technology, Nikon Instruments is the sole manufacturer and provider of the Ti2 Microscope and all of its supporting programs, components, and objectives. This is supported by their statement of sole source included on their quote for service, the information publicly available on their website, and a Google search for the terms “ti2 inverted microscope maintenance contract” (see: https://www.google.com/search?q=ti2+inverted+microscope+maintenance+contract&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-1-ab) which only returned Nikon as a contract vendor.