LSJ - Final 3-22-12 _4_.pdf

LIMITED SOURCES JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL

RFPA NO. OIS-12-074

1. Nature and/or description of the action being approved.

a. Acquisition purpose and objectives. OIS/IRSD/IMB requires a follow-on contract to maintain access to a content delivery network (CDN). The CDN shall deliver the NRC’s Public Web Site (public site; primary domain: www.nrc.gov) and no more than 9 subdomains across the Internet to its external stakeholders around the world.

The objectives of this contract are as follows.

To ensure the public site content is delivered without interruption to users in each primary Internet Service Provider (ISP) in every country of the world (except where prevented by local governmental restriction or lack of permanent internet connection);

To ensure that the public site fully supports the IPv6 protocol by September 1, 2012, while simultaneously continuing to serve users who make requests using the IPv4 protocol;

To ensure the public site remains available should the NRC’s origin server(s) (which is/are the source(s) of all content delivered by the CDN for the NRC and is/are hosted at the NRC unless otherwise designated by the NRC) become unavailable for any reason;

To provide long-term off-site backup of the public site with real-time, hot-swap failover in at least two geographically diverse (separated by at least 1,000 miles) locations that are physically located in the United States;

To ensure that all requests for content at the public site are routed through CDN servers physically located in the United States and documented to the NRC before being passed to the NRC origin server;

To provide NRC the capability to remotely request the removal of any public site content by Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) from all CDN servers and to complete the removal;

To provide NRC the capability to remotely monitor and obtain statistical reports on traffic processed by the CDN for the public site;

To ensure that the refresh interval for content requests made to the NRC origin server can be adjusted by Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) at the direction of the NRC; and

To meet each of the above objectives with a solution that has been certified at the time of contract award to comply with the requirements for a Moderate risk system as defined in National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Special Publication 800-60, Revision 1, to meet the requirements of the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 (FISMA).

b. Project background. Until January 31, 2012, this requirement was performed by a small disadvantaged business under the SBA 8(a) Business Development Program under Contract No. NRC-33-09-355. However, the contractor subcontracted most of the work to Akamai Technologies, Inc., a large business, because the required services are available only from that one unique source. It is not possible for any small business to comply with the 50 percent requirements of FAR clause 52.219-14, Limitations on Subcontracting, which is required in all small business set-asides.

Under these circumstances, the NRC requested, and the SBA approved, removal of this requirement from the 8(a) BD Program.

2. Description of the supplies or services required to meet the agency’s needs

(including the estimated value).

a. Project title. Public Web Site Content Delivery and Continuity of Operations

Services.

b. Project description: A continuation of critical operational services to maintain and expand assistance to distribute and deliver HTTP content and provide COOP services for the NRC Public Web Site (www.nrc.gov). The current contract for these services expired on January 31, 2012, and Akamai Technologies was the provider of those services. NRC intends to award a "bridge" contract to Akamai Technologies for continuation of those critical services so that it can ensure that there is no interruption in those services while NRC conducts additional market research to determine appropriate acquisition strategy for a longer-term requirement. The services under the bridge contract will include continued website caching, backup and spidering, content delivery, application scripting, monitoring, reporting tools, and automatic fail-over capabilities 24 hours a day, 365 day a year. The NRC anticipates a firm-fixed-price contract with a period of performance of one year, starting on February 27, 2012, and one (1) six-month option to extend the term of the contract. The estimated value of this action is $374,862 for the base period and $172,431 for the option period (for a total of $547,293 if the option is exercised).

3. Identification of the justification rationale [see FAR 8.405-6(a) and (b)] and, if applicable, a demonstration of the proposed contractor’s unique qualifications to provide the required supply or service.

a. Acquisition authority.

This acquisition is conducted under the authority of the Multiple Award Schedule Program. Consideration of schedule contractors will be restricted to fewer than the number required by Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 8.405-6(a)(1) (i.e., fewer than three FSS contractors).

This acquisition is conducted under the authority of the Multiple Award Schedule Program. Consideration of schedule contractors will be restricted only to the item peculiar to one manufacturer as provided in Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 8.405-6(a)(2)

b. Demonstration of the proposed contractor(s) unique qualifications to provide the required supply or service.

1) Name and address of the proposed contractor(s). Akamai Technologies, 8

Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142-1413

2) Nature of the acquisition and proposed contractor(s) unique qualifications.

Akamai Technologies is uniquely qualified to perform NRC's requirements because of the following:

CURRENT COMPLIANCE WITH THE FEDERAL INFORMATION

SECURITY MANAGEMENT ACT (FISMA) OF 2002

The contractor must comply with the requirements for a Moderate risk system as defined in National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Special Publication 800-60, Revision 1. Because only domestic (U.S.) companies can be held to FISMA requirements, the company must also be U.S. held. Akamai Technologies holds a current FISMA-moderate certification by at least one U.S. Federal cabinet-level department for requirements materially similar to those of the NRC for this acquisition.

Based on NRC's market research (discussion with other agencies, professional knowledge of the industry, internet searches), the NRC has found no other source besides Akamai Technologies that can provide a Content Delivery Network (CDN) with a current FISMA-Moderate certification or that participates in the FedRAMP initiative.

CONFIDENCE OF LAST MILE DELIVERY

The NRC requires market penetration to ensure that all public site content reaches the Internet Service Provider (ISP) of the end user accurately for users in every country around the world. Akamai Technologies provides end-to-end delivery and control of content with proprietary algorithms that connect over 95,000 Akamai servers strategically distributed in 71 countries on 1,900 networks. Eighty-five percent of all Internet users are within a single "network hop" of an Akamai server to ensure "last-mile" delivery. Based on its market research, NRC has found no other source for

X a CDN that can demonstrate the ability verify the arrival of NRC content in the ISP of the end user.

CONFIDENCE OF LAST MILE REMOVAL

The NRC requires programmatic tracking and control of all content delivered by or cached on the contractor's CDN servers in host ISPs such that any Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) found at the public site can be removed from all of the contractor's CDN servers in networks world-wide at the client's request. In order to ensure that content requested by the NRC for removal from the public site is in fact purged from ISP servers, the CDN must retain control of that content while at the ISP. Otherwise, if the content is passed to an externally controlled server, the CDN loses control of the content. Akamai Technologies retains control of the content by delivering it using proprietary algorithms on its own CDN servers co-located in the host ISP, rather than relying on the servers of an external partner to deliver the content to the user's ISP. This ensures that Akamai retains control of the cached content until shortly before it reaches the end user. Thus, when content is scheduled for removal or refresh by the NRC, Akamai retains the ability to remove or refresh the content (and to verify the task is complete) at most ISPs worldwide. Based on its market research, NRC has found no other source besides Akamai Technologies that can provide a CDN that can demonstrate the ability to verify the removal of NRC content from the ISPs of most end users.

In addition, the NRC has invested substantial time and effort in the existing configuration and FISMA certification for the Akamai Technologies CDN to support the NRC delivery requirements. The effort needed to migrate, configure, certify for FISMA compliance, and test a new CDN implementation would be cost-prohibitive and would place at risk the NRC's effort to achieve IPv6 compliance for the public site by the OMB-mandated deadline of September 30, 2012. Therefore, awarding this bridge contract acquisition to any other source besides Akamai Technologies would cause unacceptable delays in fulfilling the agency's requirements. And, as stated above, NRC's market research revealed no other sources besides Akamai Technologies that can satisfy NRC's requirements.

4. Determination by the ordering activity Contracting Officer that the order represents the best value consistent with FAR 8.404(d). Since (a) GSA has already determined the prices of the supplies and services under FSS contracts, including rates of services offered at fixed hourly rates, to be fair and reasonable; and (b) by placing an order against a schedule contract using the procedures in FAR 8.405, the ordering activity CO has concluded that the order represents the best value (see FAR 2.101) and results in the lowest overall cost alternative. However, the CO will obtain a written approval from Akamai’s proposal to determine whether it proposed the appropriate solution to meet

NRC’s minimum requirements. The CO will only award the order if the proposal has first been deemed to be technically acceptable. In addition, the CO will seek additional discounts below GSA’s current prices before placing the order.

5. Description of the market research conducted among schedule holders and the results, or a statement of the reasons market research was not conducted. List any FSS contractors, other than the source(s) named in item 4.b. above, that were contacted and the results of that communication or other market research performed among schedule contract holders. If other FSS contractors were not contacted or other FSS market research was not conducted, provide an explanation.

6. Any other facts supporting the justification. N/A

7. Statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers that led to the restricted consideration before any subsequent acquisition for the supplies or services is made.

a. Removal of barriers to competition. NRC intends to publish a sources sought notice in www.fbo.gov shortly after award to gather as much information from the marketplace as possible in a transparent manner in order to support comprehensive market research documentation for the follow-on acquisition to this order.

8. Interested Sources. The NRC published its intent to award a contract to Akamai on the governmentwide point of entry, www.fbo.gov. In response to that notice, one vendor expressed an interest in that procurement. The Contracting Officer informed the vendor of the unique capabilities that required sole source of this current bridge contract, and invited the vendor to look for a future sources sought notice as part of the NRC’s effort to compete the follow-up requirement.

9. By signing below, the technical requirements official noted above certifies that the justification is accurate and complete to the best of his/her knowledge and belief.

Designating Official

Ben Ficks Division Director, OIS IRSD Date

NRC's minimum requirements. The CO will only award the order ifthe proposal has first been deemed to be technically acceptable. In addition, the CO will seek additional discounts below GSA's current prices before placing the order.

5. Description of the market research conducted among schedule holders and the results, or a statement of the reasons market research was not conducted. List any FSS contractors, other than the source(s) named in item 4.b. above, that were contacted and the results of that communication or other market research performed among schedule contract holders. If other FSS contractors were not contacted or other FSS market research was not conducted, provide an explanation.

6. Any other facts supporting the justification. NI A

7. Statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers that led to the restricted consideration before any subsequent acquisition for the supplies or services is made.

a. Removal of barriers to competition. NRC intends to publish a sources sought notice in www.fbo.gov shortly after award to gather as much information from the marketplace as possible in a transparent manner in order to support comprehensive market research documentation for the follow-on acquisition to this order.

8. Interested Sources. The NRC published its intent to award a contract to Akamai on the governmentwide point of entry, www.fbo.gov. In response to that notice, one vendor expressed an interest in that procurement. The Contracting Officer informed the vendor of the unique capabilities that required sole source of this current bridge contract, and invited the vendor to look for a future sources sought notice as part of the NRC's effort to compete the follow-up requirement.

9. By signing below, the technical requirements official noted above certifies that the justification is accurate and complete to the best of hislher knowledge and belief.

Designating Official

B~ Division Director, DIS IRSD Date

10. This is to certify that the justification for the proposed acquisition has been reviewed and that to the best of my knowledge and belief the information and/or data provided to support the rationale and recommendation for approval is accurate and complete.

Contracting Officer

JOSEPH L. WIDDUP

Branch Chief, Division of Contracts IMT Branch Date