NNG15SD22B-209.pdf

JUSTIFICATION

FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

1. Contracting Activity: Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)

Office of Procurement, Acquisition, and Logistics Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way Eatontown, New Jersey 07724

2. Description of Action: The proposed action is for the award of a Firm-Fixed-Price delivery order 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 Cisco Model 8841 IP phones.

3. Description of the Supplies or Services: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Information and Technology, IT Operations and Services has a requirement to procure 6,470 Cisco Brand Name Model 8841 IP phones. The procurement of these phones is required as part of VA’s contingency of operations plan to ensure that VA has an emergency surge supply of phones readily available. This is due to the fact that VA must be prepared to stand up 12 emergency hospitals with additional hospital staff as well additional contact center staff, to deal with the increased need for healthcare due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The procurement of the Cisco phones will ensure VA has adequate stock to surge for emergency deployment as cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus grow. While VA's principal role is serving the health needs of military Veterans and the dependents of Veterans, in accordance with the Agency’s directive and contingency operations plan, the Agency must also be prepared when directed to treat civilians in the event of a crisis. This is called VA's "fourth mission." The 6,740 phones shall be delivered to the VA Landover warehouse in Landover, MD within 30 days of award.

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 upon market research, as described in section 8 of this justification, it was determined that only Cisco Brand Name Model 8841 IP phones have the capability to satisfy this requirement. The current Voice System (VS) infrastructure in place within the VA’s Enterprise Voice Network consists of several Cisco Unified Call Manager (CUCM) clusters. Procuring and using Cisco Brand Name Model 8841 will ensure proper integration with any existing CUCM cluster across the enterprise. Cisco phones and CUCMs utilize a proprietary database structure specific only to Cisco hardware. The required Cisco phones will integrate into an

Brand Name Cisco Phones -COVID 19 Control No. VA-20-00044731 existing CUCM that no other brand hardware would be compatible with. Additionally, VA already owns the associated licensing required to ensure the Cisco phones are fully functional. VA has an enterprise licensing agreement with Cisco which allows the addition of these phones without the need to re-negotiate licensing; therefore, only Cisco or an authorized reseller can provide the necessary products for the expansion of the existing CUCM currently deployed throughout the VA’s Enterprise Voice Network. If VA were to procure different VS products, even if another existed with qualifications that met VA’s functional needs, it would result in a duplication of costs to completely replace VA’s current existing Cisco infrastructure consisting of the CUCM, hardware and licensing. These costs would not be recovered through competition. The compatibility and interoperability issues would prove insurmountable and impractical from a technical and operational standpoint, since it would require VA to purchase an entirely new VS rather than expand on the existing infrastructure. This would lead to significant delays of at least six months which would result in a failure for the Agency to meet its contingency of operations plan to rapidly deploy the expanded fully functional VS to accommodate the additional 12 emergency hospitals with additional hospital staff as well additional contact center staff, to deal with the increased need for healthcare due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This would result in a very high risk of critical failure in being able to provide timely care to Veterans and the American public during this national crisis.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in the market research section of this document. It was determined that limited competition is viable among authorized resellers for the required Cisco Brand Name Model 8841 IP phones. 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.

Furthermore, in accordance with FAR 5.301, 16.505(b)(2)(ii)(D), and 16.505(a)(4)(iii), the award notice for this action will be synopsized on the Contracting Opportunities website and this justification will be made publicly available within 14 days of award.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: The Government will continue to conduct market research to ascertain if there are changes in the marketplace that would enable future actions to be competed.

8. Market Research: The Government’s technical experts conducted market research during March 2020 by reviewing similar hardware products to ascertain if other brands could meet VA’s functionality requirements. Specifically, the Government’s technical experts conducted web based research and discovered that while other VoIP hardware solutions from alternative manufacturers such as Blackbox and Brocade exists, the products do not meet VA’s requirements because only Cisco or an authorized reseller has access to the proprietary database specific to the expansion requirement to interconnect with the VS’s in place throughout VA’s infrastructure. Therefore, at present there is no other hardware available in the market place that can meet this requirement.

In addition, VA networking Subject Matter Experts regularly review industry trade publications and conduct internet research to ascertain if any other brand name hardware is available. Based on all of these market research efforts, the Government’s

Brand Name Cisco Phones -COVID 19 Control No. VA-20-00044731 technical experts have determined that only the aforementioned Cisco brand name hardware can meet all of the VA’s needs.

The Contract Specialist (CS) conducted market research in March 2020 by using the NASA SEWP V GWAC market research tools to determine what vendors can meet the requirement. Based on this market research, the CS found multiple service-disabled Veteran-owned small businesses (SDVOSB) capable of meeting the full requirement.

9. Other Facts: None.