Question_and_Answers__4_20_July_2015.docx

Solicitation M67004-15-R-0028 Questions and Answers arising from the issuance of the solicitation Date: 20 July 2015 Question # 1.

Reference PWS 3.1.3 The PWS states: “The contractor shall describe how they will execute a transfer from the existing to the new contract without interruption or degradation of services. Due to time constraints the transition plan shall not exceed 30 days.” Due to the number of employees to be transferred and the complexity of the work being conducted, a 30 day transition is unrealistic for any entity other than the incumbent contractor, and thus gives them an unfair advantage. Will the Government consider a transition period of at a minimum of 60 days?

Answer: Yes but not to exceed 60 days providing that award is completed on 1 Nov 2015.

Question #2.

Reference PWS 3.2.1 The PWS states: “The contractor shall attend all tailoring conferences and Tailoring Working Groups as directed by the COR and KO.” Can the Government provide information about the quantity, duration, and location of these conferences? Also can the Government provide the historical level of effort provided to these conferences?

Answer: MMC-12 tailoring process has been completely restructured to include more conferences, more upfront planning and more assessments; all of which impact the P&D contractor. Conferences will be conducted mostly in Camp Pendleton and Quantico with the exception of requirement to brief operational impacts of plans in Oki / Hawaii and normally is attended by two planners from the contractor.

During Phase II of Tailoring, the level of effort is HEAVY considering the planning efforts of MMC-11 continue as scheduled and for an estimated 7-9 months, the same group is saddled with building two squadron’s worth of plans, participating in working groups, conducting assessments and making adjustments in an effort to finalize a Prepositioning Objective.

Question #3 Reference PWS 3.2.4 The PWS states: “The contractor shall provide historical documentation and information from previous tailoring or MMC's such as capability set plans, crisis response force package composition, TAMCN changes, newly fielded equipment, or configuration changes.” Does a repository of this information exist and will an incoming contractor have access to this information? If not, the only entity that will be able to complete this requirement is the incumbent contractor and this gives them an unfair advantage in this procurement.

Answer: Yes, there are both electronic files and hard copy files of MMC actions. The government also has many of the required files and repositories. The Government will provide information upon award.

Question #4.

Reference PWS 3.2.7 In several places there is a reference that states “contractor (perform tasks) no later than 190 days prior to the offload of the first vessel of the MMC.” Can the Government provide the current schedule of when the offload of the first vessel of the MMC is? This information is necessary to understand transition and timelines of work upon contract award.

Answer: See attached MMC-11 and MMC-12 (Proposed) schedules.

Note: This also ties into question #2. All of the dates are tied to that first ship of the MMC. 190 Day mark is when we present 2 squadrons of ICODEs plans to the operating forces for review. The first ship’s detailed plans are due at the 120 Day mark which allows for any required adjustments due to recommendations by the operating forces.

Question #5 Reference PWS 3.6.3 The PWS states: “The contractor shall establish a helpdesk to monitor and track all requests for assistance and provide a quarterly report of all helpdesk's requests and resolutions.” Can the Government provide historical call volumes for this help desk? Also, are the Government furnished tools provided to accomplish this task, or will the new contractor be required to bring its own Help Desk toolset?

Answer: Call volume increases and decreases based on the maintenance production phase. There can be between 10 to 20 calls on a daily basis ranging from software and hardware support, to application configuration and maintenance, and data exchange and interface by pushing and pulling information from different repositories.

Question #6 Reference PWS 3.6.4 The PWS states: The contractor shall setup and troubleshoot government-owned systems, software applications, web-based applications such as MCPIC and or any upgrades as required.” Can the Government provide a complete list of systems, applications, and web based applications that would require set up and troubleshooting? Also, since upgrades may be required, can the Government provide specific version data for each system and application?

Answer: Total list is 25. Some are hosted and maintained locally, and others need to be interfaced with by pushing and pulling database information to internal and external locations. The core program for application and software maintenance is Windows DotNet Framework 3.5 and newer versions. All databases are less than one terabyte in size clustered to SANs running Microsoft SQL 2008 (or newer) and Oracle 11G (or newer) back-end, with a Windows 2008 (or newer) front-end in a VMWare vSphere 5.5 virtual machine environment.

Question #7 Will the Government consider establishing a 15 page limit for the Technical and Management volumes?

Answer: No.

Question #8 Will the Government consider reducing the time limit for the oral presentations to 1 hour?

Answer: No.

Question #9 What weight will be placed on the written non-technical factors volumes that will also be covered in oral presentations?

Answer: The written documentation will serve as the official record since there will be neither video nor oral recording of the oral presentations. In case of a discrepancy between the oral presentation and the written proposal, the written proposal shall govern.

Question #10 Can Foreign-Owned companies bid on this work?

Answer:

Please see DD Form 254, Block 11 a (Section J of the contract). This contract has access to Classified Information at another contractor’s facility or a Government activity. As such, all contractors are required to comply with the following:

· Need access to the classified information.

· Be organized under the laws of the United States.

· Have a reputation for integrity and lawful conduct.

· Not “be under foreign ownership, control, or influence (FOCI) to such a degree that the granting of the classified information would be inconsistent with the national interest.”

Multi-national corporations having assets/operations within the United States, registered in SAM and without any prohibitions to receiving a federal acquisition contract award may provide an offer. The prohibitions to receiving a federal acquisition contract award include not being under foreign ownership, control, or influence (FOCI) to such a degree that the granting of the classified information would be inconsistent with the national interest.

There is a prohibition on contract awards to any firm that has ownership or control of the firm by the government of a terrorist country.

Question #11.

Is the contractor required to enter its G&A amount in the Schedule (Section B)?

Answer:

The Government has not established such a requirement.