NNG15SD18B 36C10B21F0314.docx

Avaya VCL 988 Expansion Control Number: VA-21-00085465

Contract Opportunities

AWARD NOTICE

GENERAL INFORMATION

BASE NOTICE TYPE

SET-ASIDE

Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way Eatontown, NJ 07724

POINT OF CONTACT*

(POC Information Automatically Filled from User Profile Unless Entered) Kathryn.Pantages@va.gov Jamie.Valentine@va.gov

AWARD INFORMATION

LINE ITEM NUMBER

AWARDEE ADDRESS LINE 2*

AWARDEE ADDRESS LINE 3*

AWARDEE ADDRESS LINE 4*

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

AGENCY’S URL

URL DESCRITPTION

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* = Required Field Contract Opportunities Award Notice

JUSTIFICATION

FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

2. Description of Action: The proposed action is for a Firm-Fixed Price (FFP) Delivery Order (DO) to be issued under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Governmentwide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for brand name Avaya Professional Services (APS), Collaboration Pod (CPOD) hardware, and software licenses.

3. Description of Supplies or Services: VA, Veterans Crisis Line (VCL) Call Centers utilize Avaya for its telephony infrastructure. An upgrade for the existing Avaya CPOD environment at both the Albany, New York (NY) and Canandaigua, NY locations is required in order to expand the call center and support services to accommodate the National 988 initiative. On July 16, 2020 the FCC established 988 as a new nationwide number for crisis, mental health, and suicide hotline. Since its inception, the VCL has seen a steady rise in call volume. Specifically, since July of 2020, VCL has experienced a 40% call volume increase that is still trending up. It is necessary to increase the capacity of the VCL call center to be able to handle this increased call volume and increase of additional staff that the VCL requires due to the increased call volume. The Contractor shall provide brand name Avaya software licenses, CPOD hardware, and Avaya Professional Services (APS) which includes engineering, planning, configuration changes, implementation, testing and validating of new CPOD hardware, and configuration changes through APS. Specifically, the Contractor shall provide and install 300 additional agent licenses and 50 additional supervisors’ licenses; register all software and hardware in the Avaya Global Registration Process Tool (GRT); provide and install additional hardware required to support the increased amount of users; perform certificate installation to VA standard, update Avaya Aura Experience Portal, and update Avaya CPOD to R4.1.01. The Period of Performance shall be 12-months from date of award. The total estimated value of the proposed action is $_________________.

4. Statutory Authority: Pursuant to Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 16.505(a)(4), the following brand name requirement is being justified and approved as an exception to fair opportunity under the statutory authority of Section 41 U.S.C. 4106(c)(2) as implemented by FAR 16.505(b)(2)(i)(B), entitled “Only one awardee is capable of providing the supplies or services required at the level of quality required because the supplies or services ordered are unique or highly specialized.”

5. Rationale Supporting Use of Authority Cited Above: Based on market research as described in Section 8 of this justification, it was determined that limited competition is available among authorized resellers for the required brand name APS, CPOD hardware and software licenses. No other brand name can meet VA’s requirements for interoperability and compatibility with VA’s existing VCL Avaya telephony infrastructure.

Since VA currently utilizes Avaya phone systems at both Albany and Canandaigua call centers, any other brand name software application or phone system cannot communicate, nor integrate with the existing proprietary VCL Avaya telephony infrastructure. Additionally, software provided by another vendor will not integrate with the existing telephony, which is based on Avaya brand name software. Avaya is the only vendor who can continue to build upon VA’s existing VCL telephony infrastructure. Any other vendor would not be able to customize the Avaya proprietary software with the currently fielded equipment and Avaya telephony systems due to software copyright infringement. Additionally, no other vendor can manipulate Avaya’s proprietary source code. Any other source code would not be interoperable or compatible with the currently fielded Avaya devices, hardware, and Avaya Aura Experience Portal Platform. Specifically, the current system and software communicates through a source code that is based on Avaya proprietary data. No other software can provide this communication capability without this source code.

Due to proprietary constraints, the use of any other vendor hardware or software would require a complete replacement of the Avaya VCL telephony infrastructure in place. Based on previous acquisition history, replacing the existing Avaya infrastructure within the VCL and accounting for all equipment, licenses, and services currently provided by the Avaya system would cost approximately $30 million and take a minimum of a year to replace. In addition to monetary costs, if this effort was not awarded to Avaya, the VCL telephony infrastructure would lose functionality if the call centers were to fail. Without this upgrade the call center will not be able to accommodate the increase in VCL staff that is currently being hired. This upgrade will also expand system capacity to support the increased call volume that is currently stressing the system to maximum capacity. If the call centers failed to function, up to 15,000 Veterans per day would lose out on necessary services, such as the Suicide Prevention Hotline, Veterans Women’s Health, Million Veterans Program, Veterans Coaching into Care, Veterans Caregivers Support Member Services and National Contact Center for Homeless Veterans that these call centers provide.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in Section 8 of this justification. This effort did not yield any additional sources that can meet the Government’s requirements. However, it was determined that limited competition is viable among authorized resellers for brand name APS, software licenses and hardware. In accordance with FAR 5.301,16.505(b)(2)(ii)(D) and 16.505(a)(4)(iii), this action will be synopsized on the Contracting Opportunities website and the justification will be made publicly available within 14 days of award. Additionally, in accordance with FAR 16.505(a)(4)(iii)(A)(1), this justification will be provided with the solicitation to all appropriate NASA SEWP V GWAC holders.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: In order to remove or overcome barriers to competition in future acquisitions for this requirement, the Government’s technical experts will continue to conduct market research to ascertain if there are changes in the marketplace that would enable future actions to be fully competed.

8. Market Research: The Government’s technical experts conducted market research in January 2021 by reviewing other similar telephony systems from other manufacturers including those from Cisco Systems, NEC Corporation, and Siemens Technology and Services. Based on further reviews of these products, the Government’s technical experts determined that none of the products from the other brands can meet the Government’s interoperability and compatibility requirements due to the proprietary nature of the current Avaya phone system infrastructure. Additionally, none of the other brands’ products can customize the Avaya source code within the existing Avaya architecture, which is critical to ensure the proper integration to the Avaya telephony architecture needed within VCL. In addition to the above, VA telephony Subject Matter Experts regularly review industry trade publications and conduct internet research to ascertain if any other brand name software is available.

Additional market research was conducted in August of 2021, wherein the Contract Specialist utilized the Provider Lookup Tool on the NASA SEWP V GWAC website to ascertain the extent of limited competition among resellers for the required APS, software licenses and hardware. The research shows that there is a total of nineteen Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business contract holders identified as resellers of brand name Avaya. Therefore, limited competition is expected among SDVOSBs for this proposed action.

9. Other Facts: None.

10. Technical and Requirements Certification: I certify that the supporting data under my cognizance, which are included in this justification, are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Date: _______________________

Senior IT Analyst Signature: ___________________

11. Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable based upon anticipated competition and discounts among NASA V GWAC holders who are authorized resellers of the required brand name Avaya Professional Services described herein. Additionally, NASA SEWP determines that the catalog prices on its GWACs are fair and reasonable. Finally, price analysis shall be conducted by comparing the successful quote to the Independent Government Cost Estimate.

Date: ______________________

Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: __________________

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

Date: ________________________

Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: ____________________

Approval In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of brand name Avaya Professional Services, Collaboration Pod (CPOD) hardware, and software licenses on an other than fair opportunity basis pursuant to the authority cited in Section 4 above, subject to availability of funds, and provided that the property and services herein described have otherwise been authorized for acquisition.

Date: ____________ Signature: ___________________________________