Justification FAR Part 6 (JA) (JUNE 2025) - GWISS extension - final - Redacted.pdf

Control Number: T-25-0015

JUSTIFICATION REVIEW DOCUMENT

FAR Part 6 Justification and Approval for Other than Full and Open Competition

Program/Equipment: Installation security services throughout U.S. Army Garrisons (USAGs) in Germany.

Authority: 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(1) as implemented by FAR 6.302-1 – Only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements

Amount: $99.9M

Prepared by:

Contracting Officer: Thomas Dragolich Contracting Officer

Technical:

Requirements:

requirement went through a rigorous pre-solicitation planning phase with a two (2) day industry engagement held in January 2023 with a draft Performance Work Statement (PWS) posted on SAM.gov in December 2022, prior to the industry engagement. The PWS was posted again with a draft Request for Proposal (RFP) in July 2023 after the PWS was revised based on feedback from industry. During the industry engagement, posting of the draft RFP, and through proposals received for Solicitation W564KV23R0050, all offerors, excluding the incumbent, Ponds, stated the phase-in process would take six (6) months for the Germany Wide Guards requirement. The reason for the lengthy phase-in is the training, recruiting, and labor contracts required to source the plus guards in support of all of the guards’ services required by IMCOM-E. There are also unique country requirements established by the German Government required for guard training (German Industrie-und Handelskammer) and for obtaining weapons licensing (Company Firearm License -"Firmenwaffenschein" IAW § 28 WaffG), that are required to be obtained after contract award but before commencing performance. The certification period for U.S. Army certified EDD teams is another phase-in task that takes six (6) months to complete. Each of the plus contracted guards would also have to obtain a Common Access Card (CAC), a process which takes three (3) months to complete due to the amount of guards and the limited working hours available for the ID card centers to process their regular customer CAC requests, on top of the influx of requests for CAC for the contracted GWG workforce.

The GWG contract was originally awarded to Ponds (W564KV24DA001) on 30 August 2024 and received a GAO protest on 16 September 2024 from one of the unsuccessful offerors (offeror #1), which was voluntarily withdrawn on 28 October 2024. On 15 November 2024, two of the unsuccessful offerors filed a bid protest with the Court of Federal Claims (COFC). The COFC denied all the allegations from unsuccessful offeror #1 and unsuccessful offeror #2 was granted the motion for one of their allegations that required the Government to take corrective action and to issue a new award determination. On 16 June 2025, the Government issued a new award decision to Ponds (W564KV24DA001). Note that as the original IDIQ contract (W564KV24DA001) was not terminated, it was determined for administrative purposes to continue the use of the original awarded contract for the new award decision that was concluded on 16 June 2025. On 26 June 2025, a GAO protest (GAO B-422939.3) was filed for this award determination from unsuccessful offeror #2. On 3 July 2025, the Government filed a motion to dismiss the GAO protest, but GAO decided on 10 July 2025 to deny the Governments request for dismissal.

Ponds has performed as the predominate contract guard contractor of the USAGs in Germany for the past 25 years. As a result, Ponds has a well-established training school, required weapons license, U.S. Army certified EDD teams, recruiting program, and retention program that helps them facilitate and execute the requirements for the contract extension requirements. As a result of the protest and pending litigation, Ponds is the only contractor that can perform the GWISS requirements without any interruption or risk to the Government for failure to provide the mission essential services listed in the GWISS PWS.

b. Alternatives: As discussed below, awarding a sole-source bridge action to Ponds is the only viable contract solution to ensure uninterrupted support for the requirements for GWISS when considering the following alternatives:

1) Solicit the bridge contract under full and open competition. A competitive acquisition would compete the services among all sources available for this action. This alternative would be impractical to the Government as it would take the Government approximately 12 months to award a new competitive contract based on the estimated value of the short-term bridge contract; reference table in paragraph 11 (b) for summary of milestones for award. Following the award, there would need to be an additional six

(6) month phase-in period (reference para 6(a)), if the awardee is not the incumbent, to allow for the contractor’s time to complete all required tasks to be able to fulfil the GWISS requirements. If the Government were to solicit this bridge requirement on a competitive basis, there would be a significant break in service (approximately 18 months) due to the time to complete the procurement process and to conduct the phase-in. Therefore, the Government cannot procure a competitive bridge contract and allow for an adequate phase-in time before the current contract’s performance expires on 31 August 2025.

2) Award short-term contracts by geographical areas in Germany. Awarding short-term contracts by separate geographical areas to bridge the performance period would still require prospective contractors to perform the six (6) month phase-in period (reference para 6(a)) to fulfill the GWISS requirement, which includes recruiting the significant number of guards required to support the GWISS requirement. Even if contractors were interested in making such investments, this strategy would create additional costs that the short period of performance, less than 12 months, would not be expected to offset. This would also cause a substantial administrative burden on the contracting office, IMCOM-E, and USAGs. Additional work would be required for every geographical contract to ensure every contractor meets the strict German government requirements for training, weapons licenses, and the US Army EDD certification.

Furthermore, based on the estimated value of the short-term bridge contracts, even when broken out by separate geographical regions, it would take the Government approximately 12 months to award the new competitive contracts while still allowing for the six (6) month phase-in period; the total time for procurement and phase-in would be 18 months. There is insufficient time to allow for effective competition prior to 31 August 2025 when the current contract’s performance expires.

3) Use of an existing contact for the required services. The Army searched for, but did not identify, any existing contracts under which the GWISS required contract services could be acquired and performed prior to 31 August 2025. The GWISS requirement is the largest contract established for IMCOM and therefore, the requirements are unique not only for the significant scope/magnitude of the work performed, but also the difficulties of operating a contracted guard force in Germany.

4) The use of Government resources. Finally, although not an unacceptable delay, the use of Government resources to perform the required services is not an option as there are insufficient Government manpower and/or equipment resources in place to handle the services internally. To perform the guard services found in the GWISS requirement, the Army would have to divert soldiers from their core mission in USAREUR-AF to provide the guard services. Due to the current geopolitical climate and the state of readiness required by the soldiers, diverting soldiers to perform the GWISS requirements would be an unacceptable risk to the national defense. As a result, use of Government resources in support of the GWISS requirements is not a viable option.

c. Impact if not approved: Any break or delay in contracted guard services would catastrophically impact the Army’s mission with potential long-term negative consequences as the installation access control points would be unguarded and free for the public to enter the USAGs. Equipment and infrastructure would be subject to theft, vandalism, and criminal activities. Most importantly, the Army’s greatest resource, the soldier and their families, would be exposed to security risks that would impact their wellbeing and potentially their lives. Combat readiness would be impacted as commanders would have no other choice but to divert soldiers to secure the USAGs, creating conditions for commanders to fail their core mission. There is no acceptable level of break in service for any of the requirements established in the GWISS bridge contract.

7. Efforts to Obtain Competition: The Contracting Officer did not publish the notices required by FAR 5.201.

a. Effective competition: Based on information provided in paragraph 6, competition for this action is not feasible to ensure uninterrupted service. Paragraph 9 of this document contains information related to competition efforts for contract W564KV24DA001, which is under protest. Due to the requirement for a six-month phase-in period, coupled with GAO protest review period and potential corrective action, it is not possible for the Government to seek competition for this bridge contract. The Government intends to award a bridge contract to the incumbent contractor in order to maintain the required services during the protest and corrective action phase of the procurement. Due to the immense undertaking required to perform these services, awarding this bridge contract to the incumbent, Ponds, is the only viable solution to meet the Government’s needs.

8. Actions to Increase Competition: No actions are being taken to increase competition as there was adequate competition for the re-procurement for solicitation W564KV23R0050. Should additional corrective action be required, by either the GAO or

COFC, the Government will continue to use W564KV23R0050 to conduct the re-procurement for the GWG requirements. As discussed in para 6 above, no other contractors are in a position to begin the guard services defined in this bridge contract by 1 September 2025, with the exception of Pond Security Service GmbH.

9. Market Research: Extensive market research was performed during the pre-solicitation (W564KV23R0050) phase for the follow-on contract or “re-procurement” for the GWG requirements. The market research revealed numerous sources interested in performing the GWG requirements. To summarize what was stated in para 6(a) above, the contracting team conducted a two (2) day industry engagement, and posted both the draft PWS and draft RFP in an effort to encourage competition and to establish the requirement based on practicable feedback from industry. As a result of this industry engagement effort, ten (10) companies participated in providing the Government with feedback in developing the RFP and were received in response to the RFP; of which were in the competitive range. As documented in para 6(a), the offerors, except for Ponds, required a six (6) month phase-in. No other contractor can provide seamless, continuous guard services as required by the GWISS requirements by the required start of performance of 1 September 2025. Note that although the market research was conducted more than 12 months prior to this bridge action, the Germany contracted guards requirement is a mature program with an extensive procurement history, therefore, it is not expected that additional market research would yield a different conclusion other than as explained in this section.

10. Interested Sources: In accordance with DFARS 205.205-71, DFARS 206.302-1(d), and DFARS PGI 206.302-1(d), a request for information (RFI) was posted to SAM.gov on 11 July 2025 for 16 days, closing on 28 July 2025, and the Government received no responses.

11. Other Facts:

a. Procurement history:

Contract number, awarded Contractor: W564KV-19-D-0002, Pond Security Service

GMBH

Description of requirement: Germany Wide Installation Security Services (GWISS) Method of procurement: Unrestricted Contract type: IDIQ, FFP, Single Award Period of performance: 29 July 2019 – 28 July 2024* Ceiling Value: €525,000,000 Number of option periods: Ordering period of five (5) years with an optional six (6) month extension to the ordering period IAW FAR 52.217-8 Number of Offerors:

Source Selection Method: Best Value Tradeoff Process Basis for fair and reasonable pricing: Competition

*52.217-8 extended the ordering period until 28 January 2025 with deliveries, IAW 52.216-22, allowed through 31 December 2025 as long as the contract maximum was not exceeded. As a result, TOs were placed with performance through 31 August 2025 when the contract maximum was reached.

Contract number, awarded Contractor: W564KV-15-D-0001, Pond Security Service

GMBH

Description of requirement: Germany-wide guard services Method of procurement: Unrestricted Contract type: IDIQ, FFP, Single Award Period of performance: 1 January 2015 – 31 December 2018 Ceiling Value: €358,000,000 Number of option periods: 3 option years and a six-month option IAW FAR 52.217-8 Number of Offerors:

Source Selection Method: Lowest Price Technically Acceptable Basis for fair and reasonable pricing: Competition

Contract number, awarded Contractor: W564KV-09-D-0015, Pond Security Service

GMBH

Description of requirement: Germany-wide guard services Method of procurement: Unrestricted Contract type: IDIQ, FFP, Single Award Period of performance: 30 May 2009 – 28 May 2014 Ceiling Value: $735,000,000 Number of Offerors:

Source Selection Method: Best Value Tradeoff Process Basis for fair and reasonable pricing: Competition

Contract number, awarded Contractor: DABN01-03-D-0028, Pond Security Service GMBH; DABN01-03-D-0029, Securitas GMBH Description of requirement: Germany-wide guard services Method of procurement: Unrestricted Contract type: IDIQ, FFP, Single Award Period of performance: 01 Sep 2003 - 29 May 2009 / 01 Sep 2003 – 31 Aug 2007 Ceiling Value: $1,300,000,000 / $288,000,000 Number of Offerors:

Source Selection Method: Best Value Tradeoff Process Basis for fair and reasonable pricing: Competition

b. Milestones for award of a competitive bridge contract: The milestone chart below provides a basic outline of the time to award a competitive contract equal to the bridge contract outlined in this document. As noted in paragraph 6 (b), the process to award a competitive contract would take approximately 12 months.

Estimated Milestone Date

Sources Sought Notice August 2025

Complete Customer Acquisition Package and Approval October 2025

Approval of Combined Acq Strategy/Acq Plan November 2025

Issue Draft RFP December 2025

Finalize Source Selection Plan January 2026

Solicitation Review Board February 2026

Issue RFP March 2026

Receive Proposals April 2026

Complete Initial Evaluations May 2026

Competitive Range Determination June 2026

Open Discussions June 2026

Revised Proposals Due/Close Discussions July 2026

Final Evaluations Complete July 2026

SSEB Report Complete August 2026

SSAC Recommendation Complete August 2026

SSDD Complete September 2026

Contract Review Board (CRB) September 2026

Contract Award September 2026

c. Other facts: A nine (9) month ordering period was determined to be appropriate as this is the estimated time required to resolve the GAO protest, conduct any corrective action(s), conduct a phase-in (if required), or to litigate a COFC protest (if required). The summary below provides the reasons why a nine (9) month ordering period for this bridge contract is reasonable:

1) The current contract performance ends 31 August 2025.

2) GAO’s decision for the protest (GAO B-422939.3) is due in early October 2025.

3) Should any corrective action be required as directed by the GAO, it is estimated that it will take two (2) months to complete.

4) The phase-in period, as noted in paragraph 6, would take six (6) months to complete if a new award decision was made other than to Ponds.

5) At this time, it is not known if a subsequent COFC protest will be filed after the GAO protest is resolved. However, if it should be, the six (6) month period for the phase-in would not be necessary and would then be time allotted to resolve the COFC protest.

Although the ordering period will be for nine (9) months, any TOs placed against the bridge IDIQ will only be placed for the duration (period of performance) necessary to resolve any protest(s) received for W564KV24DA001; to include COFC and any time required to resolve any corrective action as directed by the GAO and/or COFC.

The estimated value of this bridge contract is which was established IAW FAR 16.504(a)(1), using a reasonable basis for estimating the maximum from the ELIN pricing of year five (5) for W564KV19D0002 with an escalation due to inflation, reduced for a potential period of performance of nine (9) months; an additional buffer was included should IMCOM-E have an increase in guard requirements due to the current geopolitical situation. The original contract maximum is set in euro for W564KV19D0002 at €525,000,000. The bridge contract will increase the euro contract maximum by €85,914,000; this is $99,900,000 multiplied by the current exchange rate (.086), per XE.COM as of 28 July 2025. The new ceiling for W564KV19D0002 will be €610,914,000

12.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.

Signatur

Typed Name: Title:

13. 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.

Signature:

Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated price/cost to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable. This determination will be made using cost and price analysis techniques in accordance with FAR subpart 15.4 including a review of pricing received in response to the protested re-procurement and an analysis of historical pricing. Certified cost or pricing data will not be required as this is a commercial service.

Signature:

Typed Name: Thomas Dragolich Title: Contracting Officer

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

Signature

Typed Name: Thomas Dragolich Title: Contracting Officer

Approval

Based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the procurement of Germany Wide installation security services on an other than full and open competition basis pursuant to the authority of Title 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(1), as implemented by FAR 6.302-1, Only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements. The estimated value of this bridge contract is for a nine (9) month ordering period from 1 September 2025 through 31 May 2026. The approval is subject to availability of funds, and provided that the services herein described have otherwise been authorized for this acquisition.

Signature: Date: