RTCASS CLS Q A responses-20aug12.doc

RFP N68335-12-R-0112: RTCASS CLS: Q&A’S

RTCASS CLS: Q&A’S

Question 1 –

What is the correct title of the third element under Technical Approach of Section L, “ATE Knowledge” or “ATE Interoperability”?

Answer: RFP Section L page 70 correct title is ATE Knowledge vice ATE Interoperability. The RFP will be modified to read as follows;

“ATE Knowledge: The offeror shall describe the interaction of ATE hardware, software and TPSs. Explain your ability to support the different levels of support required for the ATE Hardware, Software and TPSs.”

Question 2 Page 70 of Section L identifies the second section in Volume II regarding to ATE Support Experience and PBL/CLS Experience with the Department of Defense. ?

Answer: The Government will consider both Performance Base Logistics (PBL) and Contract Logistics Support (CLS) under Corporate Experience. The RFP will be modified to read as follows;

ATE Support Experience: The Offeror shall describe their experience supporting Automatic Test Equipment (ATE) under a PBL/CLS environment. Include a discussion of support ATE hardware, Software and SMAT/Cal TPSs.

PBL/ CLS Experience with the Department of Defense: The Offeror shall describe their experience in supporting PBL/CLS contracts for the Department of Defense providing or identifying specific contracts under which they or their critical subcontactors obtained the experience. Include information and/or data regarding the type of equipment supported, the total number and diversity of products supported; demonstrated capability to provide world wide support. Include a discussion of challenges and lessons learned as well as demonstrated successes in supporting DoD/DoN under PBL/CLS contracts.

Question 3

The first paragraph within Section L Paragraph 3.1, General, on page 73 states:

Between the third and fourth lines (see red arrow), the font changes and there appears to be something omitted between the words “solicitation” and “Commercial”. If so, what is the correct version of this paragraph?

Answer: The first paragraph within Section L Paragraph 3.1, General, on page 73 will be updated to remove the words ‘in solicitation..’as stated below:

3.0 VOLUME III - PAST PERFORMANCE

3.1. General

The Offeror shall identify any contracts performed within five years of this proposal submission date, containing efforts similar to the contract requirements in the solicitation, e.g., tasks, complexity, contract type, contract dollar value, etc. ,, performed by the Offeror, Offeror's principal subcontractors, and critical team members. in solicitation Commercial contracts may be included. List the contracts from the most relevant to the least relevant. In general, recent performance will be considered more relevant than older performance. When possible, these contracts should include at least five of the most relevant contracts for the prime contractor, five of the most relevant contracts for each critical team member, and two of the most relevant contracts for each principal subcontractor (as defined in Paragraph I, General Instructions). If proposing as joint venture/single legal entity (JV/SLE), the Offeror should provide the five past performance references for the JV/SLE. If less than the five past performance references are available for the JV/SLE, each member of the JV/SLE should individually submit the five references in addition to their JV/SLE references.

Question 4 An excerpt of Table 1, The Fleet Station Fielding Profile, within RFP_ATT_006___RTCASS_Fielding_Profile_revC.doc) provides the following information:

Are the fielding numbers (highlighted by the red oval) correct? If these nine stations are fielded in Year One, will they need to be supported throughout Year Two, i.e., should their station months for Year Two be “12”?

If these Year Two months are 12, then the Page 3 Totals for Year Two and Year Three appear to be identical. In other words for Years Two and Three, should the “Total Station/Months” be 1596.0 and the Average Stations Supported be 133.00?

Is the Year Three time period (highlighted by the green oval) correct? As stated, it currently overlaps the Year Two time period. If the Year Three time period is incorrect, should it be changed to: “12/01/14 to 11/30/15”?

Answer

The requirements for 9 of the sites in the Fielding Profile attachment were incorrect. An updated attachment 006 is provided.

Question 5 The Attachment 001, Statement of Work identifies some high-level calibration services requirements. What are the specific equipment items requiring calibration to include their part numbers, quantities, locations, and calibration periods?

Answer

Please see the following for RTCASS calibrated items and their calibration intervals.

RTCASS CALIBRATED ITEMS

Question 6 Page 71, Section L, Paragraph 1B, Corporate Structure, Sub Vendor Logistics Structure and Subcontracting Plans, states: “Provide a subcontracting plan for the current solicitation…….” Should the Offeror provide subcontracting plan as a CDRL item within a specific period after contract award? Or, should the Offeror provide the subcontracting plan as an annex within its proposal submission?

Answer: Subcontracting plan shall be provided with the Proposal.

Question 7 If the subcontracting Plan is provided as an annex, does this plan count against the 150 page limitation of the Technical Volume?

Answer: Shall be provided as a separate Annex and does not count against the 150 page limitation of the Technical Volume.

Section L – Contents of Proposals

In Section L-Contents of proposals, Part A General Instructions1.0-GENERAL it states:

“the Offerors are advised that the Government may incorporate into the final contract any part of the Offeror’s proposal deemed beneficial to the Government. The

Government reserves the right to incorporate any proposed enhancing features in excess of the Government’s requirements into the resultant contract, thus becoming the minimum requirement. With the exception of Volume 4 (Cost), no cost should appear in any other volume. Alternate proposals are not acceptable.”

Question 8:

Please define what “enhancing features” means. Is this a Threshold and Objective by another name?

ANSWER: An Enhancing Feature is aspect of an offeror’s proposal that will be advantageous to the Government during contract performance. No, it is not a threshold and objective.

Question 9:

How can the Government include enhancing features in a contract unless they were offered?

ANSWER: The Offeror’s proposal must include the enhancing feature.

Question 10:

How can the Offeror include/offer “Enhancing features “when alternate proposals are specifically excluded as being not acceptable? Please clarify.

ANSWER:

An Enhancing Feature can be included in a proposal that meets the requirement of the RFP. An Enhancing Feature is aspect of an offeror’s proposal that that will be advantageous to the Government during contract performance.

Question 11 Is SOW Paragraph 5.3 a duplication of the current Finnish Government - Insta

DefSec Contract for RTCASS Technical Support? Should Offerors include these Paragraph 5.3 tasks in their bids? Or, Should Paragraph 5.3 be deleted from the CLS SOW?

Answer:

No. Technical support for FMS customers shall be considered within the contract's scope of contemplated activity. However there are no specific FMS customer requirements for technical support to be included with the solicitation at this time. There is no requirement to provide price this effort at this time. Any specific FMS customer requirements for technical support that arise after contract award shall be added by a change order and subsequent equitable adjustment to the contract. Therefore proposals will not be evaluated with respect to the technical support requirement, beyond offerors providing an acknowledgement in their proposals that they shall provide FMS technical support after receipt of either a change order or contract modification.

SOW section 5.3 shall be revised in a forthcoming amendment to make clear that the addition of any such work will be by an equitable adjustment to the contract.

Question 12

Section M E Paragraph (3.0) Evaluation Factors for Award pages 81 & 82 indicates that the evaluation factors are listed in order of importance as follows: Technical, Corporate Experience and Past Performance factor. In this section it identifies:

1. Technical

A. Technical Approach

• ATE Interoperability

• ATE Configuration

Section L Paragraph 1A on page 70 & 71 reads as follows: “ATE Interoperability: The offeror shall describe the interaction of ATE hardware, software and TPSs. Explain your ability to support the different levels of support required for the ATE Hardware, Software and TPSs.”

ATE Configuration: Provide the Offeror’s process to incorporate changes to repairable assets while maintaining Configuration control.

The Corporate Experience Section (page 82 of section M) fails to mention addressing corporate experience in either of these two important technical criteria.

The Past Performance criteria (in section L) does not require any discussion of relevant past performance during previous contracts involving demonstrated experience to support the technical criteria related to the interaction of ATE Hardware, software and

TPSs.

A bidder may provide acceptable descriptions for both of the Interoperability and Configuration criteria, and yet have no actual corporate experience or past performance in either area. Should lack of corporate experience and/or past performance preclude an offeror from being deemed technically acceptable?

Answer:

Whether an offeror has the ability to provide adequate descriptions that demonstrate its understanding of the techical sub-factors and elements shall be evaluated under the technical subfactors. Under the Corporate Experience factor the Government will evaluate whether, and to what extent, an Offeror has performed similar work before, as stated at Section M, Section 2.0 page 83. Lack of relevant experience could result in an adverse Confidence Assessment rating. Under the past performance factor the offeror’s past performance will be evaluated to determine how relevant a recent effort is to this instant effort. The offeror must provide the information requested for performance risk evaluation, or affirmatively state that it possesses no directly related or similar past performance. Where an offeror is without any relevant past performance, or such information is not available or is unknown the offeror will not be evaluated favorably or unfavorably and will be assigned a rating of “neutral”.

A forthcoming amendment shall change Section L, Section 1A technical approach subfactor, page 70, changing the element title from ‘ATE Interoperability’ to ‘ATE Knowledge’ to be consistent with the title of that element at Section M page 82/83.

Question 13: Shouldn’t the evaluation Criteria also require the offerors to produce examples of relevant corporate experience in these two technical areas as well as the CLS areas identified?

ANSWER:

ATE Support experience is sought at Section M, Section 2.0 page 83 of the solicitation.

Question 14 : Shouldn’t there be a requirement to provide past performance information on all areas of corporate experience cited?

ANSWER:

As stated at Section M, section 3.0, subsection 3.1 at page 73, the offeror shall identify any contracts performed within five years of this proposal submission date.It is incumbant upon the offeror to explain the relevance of the data provided.

Question 15. Page 70 of Section L requests Offerors describe their resources that provide the” multiple levels of support “described in the SOW. The SOW does not describe “multiple levels of support”. What are the “multiple levels of support” that the Logistic Support Concept must address?.

ANSWER: Multiple service levels of support refers to the General requirements, Fleet specific requirements, non-fleet specific requirements, and and FMS requirements set forth at sections 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and 5.0 of the RFP Attachment 001 SOW.

Question 16. Page 70 of Section L requests Offerors describe their resources that provide the” multiple levels of support “described in the SOW. The SOW does not describe “multiple levels of support”. What are the “multiple levels of support” that the Logistic Support Concept must address?.

ANSWER: The SOW describes services for FLEET, NON-FLEET and FOREIGN MILITARY SALES (FMS) customers. set forth at sections 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and 5.0 of the RFP Attachment 001 SOW. Each customer type has specific support requirements. Section L, paragraph 1A is referring to these customer support requirements.

Question 17:

Section L – 3.0 PROPOSAL CONTENT AND VOLUMES states “The page limit INCLUDES pages such as: Table of Contents, lists of tables/figures, tab pages, acronym listing, executive summary, etc.” Should the statement read “INCLUDES” or “EXCLUDES”?

ANSWER: The statement on page limits in Section L is correct. The statement correctly reads as ‘INCLUDES’.

Question 18:

In reference to Section L, 4.0 - Are hand-carried proposals accepted at this address? Is the delivery deadline (date) 4 p.m. Eastern Standard Time?

ANSWER: Yes hand carried proposals are aceptable at this address. Drop off of the proposal must be arranged in advance. The delivery deadline is 4 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Question 19:

If the RTCASS product line has reached Milestone D, why are there repairables that are identified in the parts list Attachment 003 with 0Q and 0R COG's?

ANSWER : All RTCASS repairables should have a 7R cognizance code (COG). Any repeairables that have not been updated to the latest COG are in process.

Question 20

In RFP Attachment 006, RTCASS Fielding Profile rev C, there are nine stations that require less than a full year of support in year 2. Why is year 2 less than 12 months of support?

ANSWER : The requirements for 9 of the sites in the Fielding Profile attachment were incorrect. An updated attachment 006 is provided here, and shall be included in a forthcoming solicitation amendment.

Question 21

The RFP does not address how the Government intends to fund the repair of parts and replacement of consumables during station installation. Will the Government add a cost-reimbursable CLIN to cover this?

ANSWER :

Installation efforts are covered under the Non-Fleet CLIN. Attachment 008 has been updated here to show which repairs originated from the install team, and shall be included in a forthcoming solicitation amendment.

Question 22

In Attachment 007, RTCASS Class II ECPs, 01 Jan 2011, the list does not contain ECPs after October 2010. Will the Government provide all ECP data?

ANSWER :

Attachment 007 has been updated here to include the latest Class II ECPs recorded , and shall be included in a forthcoming solicitation amendment.

Question 23

Attachment 009, Scheduled GFP, 03 Jul 2012, and Attachment 010, Requisitioned GFP, 03 Jul 2012, list Navy-owned Fleet spares that will be provided. Will the Government also provide non-Fleet spares as GFE? If so, please provide a list.

ANSWER :

Attachment 009 contains Navy-owned Non-Fleet spares. The attachment has been updated here to include Fleet repairables, and shall be included in a forthcoming solicitation amendment.

Question 24

The RFP requests providing calibration support activities for both Non-Fleet and FMS customers. Is the intent of these CLINs to provide calibration support for the RTCASS SMAT/CAL equipment and any station off equipment calibrated items?

ANSWER :

The intent for Section 4.2 of the SOW is to provide calibration support services for the standards used to calibrate RTCASS. The SMAT/CAL set is considered an OTPS, and is separate from the calibration standards set. A list of RTCASS calibrated items to be covered under this requirement can be found in RFP Attachment 011.

Question 25

The RFP does not include a complete list of all equipment that is necessary to calibrate an RTCASS station. Can the Navy please provide a list of all the equipment that constitutes a SMAT/CAL set and what non-fleet sites will require the contractor to provide calibration services for?

ANSWER :

Please see RFPAttachment 011 for RTCASS calibrated items and their calibration intervals.

Question 26

The RFP does not include a list of any equipment related to maintenance and calibrating RTCASS stations nor does it delineate what equipment will be provided as GFE. Can the Government please provide a complete listing of all SMAT/CAL inventory for Fleet, Non-Fleet and FMS that is available to support this effort?

ANSWER :

The Government is not providing RTCASS stations or RTCASS SMAT/CAL OTPSs as GFE specifically for this contract.

Question 27

Does the Government want contractors to submit a model contract, including Section K? If so, in which volume?

ANSWER :

The Government does not require submission of a model contract. Section K responses should be provided in the Cost volume.

Question 28

Will the 30 day turnaround time specified in (CLS SOW Para. 2.3.2) be required for PQDRs?

ANSWER :

The 30 day repair turn-around-time (RTAT) is applicable to all repairs.

Question 29

What are the Government's requirements to ensure repaired assets meet RTCASS performance specifications?

ANSWER :

Section 2.5 of the SOW requires the Contractor to ensure that all RTCASS components provided are in compliance with the RTCASS Technical Data Package (TDP). Parts that are not in compliance with the TDP may be discovered many ways. This includes, but is not limited to DCMA inspections, station self-testing, shceduled/unshceduled calibration and PQDRs.

Question 30

In order to provide a baseline starting point for obsolescence monitoring, will the Government provide current obsolescence status report for the RTCASS BOM?

ANSWER :

The Government will provide a list of all obsolescence and DMSMS relevant items upon contract award.

Question 31

In order to ensure proper configuration control tracking per the RFP requirement, is the customer requesting the contractor to maintain station configuration information or asset level information?

ANSWER :

Section 2.8.2 of the SOW requires the Contractor to maintain a record of each failure/turn-in. This includes some configuration data. The SOW does not require the Contractor to track the configuration of assets at the station level.

Question 32

The solicitation requires the service provider to support FMS RTCASS Stations. Will the Government provide a list of spares currently used and to be used to support the FMS customer?

ANSWER :

There are currently no wholesale spares assets maintained by PMA260 for FMS customers.

Question 33

Reference 5252.215-9512 SAVINGS CLAUSE (NAVAIR)(JUN 2012) - This provision limits profit for ODCs on ODC CLINs. Could the USG please clarify which CLINs are classified as ODC CLINs? None of the CLINs appear to be designated as ODC CLINs.

ANSWER :

Reference 5252.215-9512 SAVINGS CLAUSE (NAVAIR)(JUN 2012) shall be removed from the solicitation in a forthcoming amendment.

Question 34

What is the Period of Performance for the RTCASS Solicitation, N68335-12-R-0112?

ANSWER :

The Period of Performance is one Base year and 2 Option years from date of contract award.

Question 35 (a-e)

a. According to the RTCASS Production contract, N68335-10-C-0491, there would be

149 stations delivered by the end of January 2013. However, the RTCASS Fielding

Profile included in the RFP states there would be 154 stations delivered by the end of January 2013. Please provide clarification.

b. According to the RTCASS Production contract, N68335-10-C-0491, there would be

164 stations delivered by the end of the Period of Performance. However, the

RTCASS Fielding Profile included in the RFP states there would be 157 stations delivered by the end of the Period of Performance. Please provide clarification.

c. According to the RTCASS Production contract, N68335-10-C-0491, one (1) RTCASS station should be fielded per month until the end of the contract. However, the RTCASS

Fielding Profile shows some months will have more than one (1) station fielded and some months will have zero (0) stations fielded. Please provide clarification.

d. According to the RTCASS Fielding Profile, it shows there will be one (1) RTCASS station fielded in December 2013 and two (2) RTCASS stations fielded in January 2016.

However, this does not align with the RTCASS Production contract, N68335-10-C-0491.

Please provide clarification.

e. According to the RTCASS Fielding Profile, there are serial numbers missing in the tables. Please provide the serial numbers that are currently not filled in on the tables.

ANSWER :

As the RTCASS fielding plan is subject to change. Therefore, for the purposes of this solicitation, offerors should propose according to the current RFP ATT 006 RTCASS fielding Profile provided.