SRI_SIMON_iPOET_J A_16_0417_REDACTED.docx

DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY

NAVAL AIR WARFARE CENTER AIRCRAFT DIVISION

IN REPLY REFER TO:

J&A_16_0417

J&A_16_0417

JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL

FOR USE OF OTHER THAN FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION

1. Contracting Activity

Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division (NAWCAD) Lakehurst, NJ.

2. Description of the Action Being Approved

This Justification and Approval (J&A) authorizes and approves the issuance of a cost plus fixed fee delivery order under Basic Ordering Agreement (BOA) N68335-12-G-0011 on a sole source basis to SRI International, Menlo Park, CA for the development, testing, installation, and integration of the Smart Integration Manager, Ontologically Networked (SIMON) framework in order to demonstrate its applicability as a means of automating the International Program Opportunity Engagement Tool (iPOET) for international cooperative opportunity identification and naval acquisition support. This procurement will be funded with Fiscal Year (FY) 16 Navy Research Development Testing and Evaluation (RDT&EN) funds. The period of performance shall be 12 months.

3. Description of Supplies/Services

The contractor shall provide software and program management support to include research, software development, system support, and manuals in support of the continued development of a SIMON based proof of concept demonstration of the U.S. Navy’s iPOET. The SIMON derived demonstration iPOET system will have the ability to leverage unique standardized semantic inference engines along with sophisticated reasoning abilities to integrate programmatic (cost, schedule), operational, and technical performance and requirements data to assist decision makers in identifying feasible international cooperative opportunities.

The work under contract is a direct continuation of efforts performed under N68335-12-G-0011-0009 and will comprise engineering research and development to apply and extend the unique semantic and automated reasoning technology, known as “Sunflower”, previously developed by SRI to fill capability gaps in a broad range of Department of Defense (DOD) and other Government domains, including training, testing and evaluation, and acquisition. The deliverable is a prototype capability that demonstrates the readiness of SIMON to transition to direct operational support for iPOET.

Estimated Dollar Values In Thousands

4. Statutory Authority Permitting Other than Full and Open Competition

10 U.S.C. 2304(c) (1), FAR 6.302-1: only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.

5. Rationale Justifying Use of Cited Statutory Authority

SRI International, under the competitively awarded contract N68335-07-C-0500 for research and development of a comprehensive, robust and integrated maritime domain awareness system for special missions programs became the sole developer and provider of the services oriented architecture based SIMON framework. Additional modifications and upgrades to the SIMON framework have been accomplished under BOA N68335-12-G-0011.

Additionally, SRI developed the Sunflower rules and reasoning Integrated Development Environment (IDE) under sponsorship of three DOD projects; Open Netcentric Interoperability Standards for Training and Testing (ONISTT), rule authoring and validation environment, and analyzer for netcentric system test confederations. The Sunflower IDE represents a breakthrough in technology as it enables integrated development of rules, ontologies, and reasoning to solve complex problems and assist in complex decision-making.

The government has a long-standing interest in leveraging previous investments in the development of both the SIMON framework and the Sunflower IDE to include this proposed acquisition. Under ONISTT tasking, SRI developed a prototype automated requirements specification and analysis capability in support of government acquisition and demonstrated its application to the air and maritime instrumentation and network domains. Application of SIMON and Sunflower technologies to the iPOET process model is the initial step in leveraging these investments and expanding their applicability to the acquisition domain.

By having the original SIMON software developer continue to perform the development, enhancement, test, integration, and remediation of SIMON framework in support of the Navy International Program Office’s iPOET effort, the government will realize a savings in both time and cost equaled to that incurred under the previous SIMON contract efforts. This savings would come from avoiding delays caused by developmental learning curves and the redundant development of proprietary tools to manage the existing codebase (250K+ Source Lines of Code) that would be required of other companies.

6. Description of Efforts Made to Solicit Offers from as Many Offerors as Practicable

A request for information/sources sought was posted to the Federal Business Opportunities website on14 June 2016, with a response date of 19 June 2016, no responses were received. A synopsis was posted to the Federal Business Opportunities website on 20 June 2016, with a response date of 4 July 2016. No responses were received in reference to the synopsis posted on Federal Business Opportunities.

7. Determination of Fair and Reasonable Cost

In accordance with FAR 15.402, the Contracting Officer shall ensure that the contract is awarded at a fair and reasonable price. SRI will submit a formal price proposal with certified cost or pricing data and sufficient information to support the accuracy and reliability of the estimate. SRI's proposal will be reviewed by experienced technical analysts, cost analysts and contract specialists with the aid of necessary field pricing support. The Contracting Officer will utilize cost and price analysis as the basis for negotiating a fair and reasonable price.

8. Actions to Remove Barriers to Future Competition

As a means of promoting industry involvement with the development of the Sunflower IDE, a Sunflower community edition will be released as an open source IDE project to support the development of a community of interest and promote the use of this technology in a broad class of domains. Part of the intent of this contract is to maintain the development and enhancement of the Sunflower technology until the open source community can be established. Until this community is established, SRI’s experience as well as its knowledge of the open source process and commitment to this strategy is unique. As a means of facilitating greater promulgation of the SIMON framework, SRI is working with the atlantic test range to integrate SIMON into the Navy Edge Systems Governance Activity (SGA). Future efforts which are identified as a result of this contract may be able to leverage the Sunflower open source community or the Navy Edge SGA in order to provide a greater means for competition.

TECHNICAL/REQUIREMENTS CERTIFICATION

I certify that the facts and representations under my cognizance which are included in this Justification and its supporting acquisition planning documents, except as noted herein are complete and accurate to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Technical Cognizance:

Requirements Cognizance:

LEGAL SUFFICIENCY REVIEW

I have determined this Justification is legally sufficient.

CONTRACTING OFFICER CERTIFICATION

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

APPROVED

Upon the basis of the above Justification, I hereby approve the solicitation of the proposed procurement described herein using other than full and open competition, pursuant to the authority of 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(1), FAR 6.302-1: only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.

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