P03 JA MAS FINAL redacted.pdf

IBM Maximo Application Suite Control Number

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, NJ 07724

2. Description of Action: The proposed action is for a firm-fixed-price Delivery Order issued under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for brand name International Business Machines (IBM) Maximo Enterprise Asset and Work Management (EAWM) licensing and technical support to the Cloud-based Maximo Application Suite (MAS) entitlement.

3. Description of the Supplies or Services: The VA, Office of Information and Technology (OIT), Product Delivery Service (PDS) Health Services Portfolio (HSP) Healthcare Logistics and Environmental Management (HELM) Product Line has a requirement to procure brand name IBM Maximo Application Suite software upgrade subscription and technical support. Currently VA OIT PDS utilizes the IBM Maximo EAWM product for asset management and supply chain activities. Maximo is used by over

This action is for the upgrade to the Cloud-based MAS due to IBM’s End of Support for Maximo EAWM as of September 30, 2025. VA must utilize the MAS version of Maximo and migrate to the VA Enterprise Cloud (VAEC) prior to this deadline.

The IBM MAS renewal software upgrade of the current subscription and technical support shall: (1) renew the current Maximo footprint at VA; (2) provide updates to the IBM MAS software in the VAEC; (3) sustain and support the existing IBM Maximo sites; and thus, (4) sustain the tracking of medical assets throughout the VA. The technical support for IBM Maximo software shall provide telephone and online support, which includes download and access to fixes, feature packs, security alerts and patches, incremental enhancements, new releases, and new versions of the software. VA requires this renewal/ software subscription upgrade and associated technical support to ensure that VA's needs are met, and that the software remains operational and usable for more than 150,000 logistics and supply chain personnel. The period of performance shall be 12-months from January 1, 2025, through December 31, 2025. The total estimated value 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 document, it was determined that limited competition is available for the brand name IBM Maximo Application Suite software subscription upgrade and technical support. IBM Maximo was initially deployed in 2012, and as of October 2024, IBM Maximo is currently operational in Veterans Affairs Medical Centers spread across seven VISNs as well as VA Central Office (VACO); the Office of Inspector General (OIG); Office of Utilization, Tracking, and Disposition (UTD); and the Office of Connected Health (OCH). In addition, deployment of IBM Maximo software was implemented within the Office of Integrated Veteran Care (IVC) in July 2023; and a new Maximo site was activated for the VA Law Enforcement Training Center (LETC), Little Rock, AR, in March 2024.

IBM Maximo software serves a critical function providing lifecycle support for more than active users in the IBM Maximo system with more than in managed asset value. Those users are reporting and solving on average 27,000 service requests a month and 85,000 work orders per month.

IBM Maximo is used by Biomedical Engineering, Facilities Management, and Environmental Management to manage work orders, schedule maintenance, safety recalls, and other functions necessary to provide a safe and effective environment of care. IBM Maximo is also used by Logistics and OlT, as well as the OIG for property accountability.

It is imperative that the IBM MAS software subscription upgrade and technical support services, such as bug fixes and product enhancements, are renewed to ensure the IBM Maximo system functions properly and remains current over time. This is a mature application, currently in sustainment, which has been iteratively developed over a 12-year period since the inception of the program within the VA in 2012.

During the development phase of this effort, the project utilized over 40 subcontractors of various technical disciplines to gather requirements, produce training, configure IBM Maximo, and manage the transition from Veterans Health Information Systems and Technology Architecture (VistA) to IBM Maximo.

Requirements were solicited from five distinct communities representing Healthcare Technology Management, Environmental Management Services, Facilities Manager, IT Asset Management, and Personnel Property Management. Additionally, requirements were solicited from OIG and OCH.

The effort to tailor this Commercially Available Off-The-Shelf (COTS) product and configure interfaces for VA use has consumed numerous man-hours for customization and configuration which would need to be repeated for any other COTS solution. Custom programming has been and is required to interface with other VA systems. Additionally, considerable customization effort was expended to include VA specific conventions, taxonomy, and statutory requirements which are not included in any COTS product of this nature. Some examples include VA Medical Device Nomenclature System (MDNS), Equipment Inventory List (EIL), Category Stock Number (CSN) as well as hierarchical mapping of facility space (station, campus, building, floor, room). Throughout IBM Maximo are features and capabilities which have been implemented to support VA policy, for example the differentiation between assets loaned to employees versus assets loaned to contractors which have varying certification periods. The overall effort to customize the Maximo software to incorporate VA taxonomies, interface with VA systems, and customize to VA’s processes has occurred over the course of 12 years. Due to proprietary restraints, no other solution can work with Maximo solution and therefore would require a complete replacement of the existing infrastructure, dual license usage until a new solution is completely integrated with VA systems and would require VAMCs and VA offices to spend at least 6 months of data cleansing efforts for more than 150,000 user accounts and over 1.6M individual assets. To complete the custom programing and configuration to recreate these customizations in a new product with a comparable footprint is estimated to take approximately 18 months after the procurement and would require approximately in additional license funding to run two system concurrently until a new replacement solution is completely integrated and approximately for new required support services that is not anticipated to be recovered through competition. These estimates are based upon previous OIT and recent VHA supply chain product acquisition history.

Based upon the above information, only IBM or an authorized reseller has the ability to meet VA's requirements. No other brand of software license subscriptions or technical support is compatible with, or interoperable with, the existing IBM Maximo proprietary structures, protocols, and software application programming interfaces. As the source code required to interface between the existing architecture components and issue updates to the existing software license subscriptions are proprietary, failure to renew the current software license subscriptions and technical support would cause operational failure, resulting in sites not being able to perform maintenance on critical assets within the VAMCs and other dependent organizations. IBM Maximo is used to maintain all types of VA equipment. Among these items IBM Maximo is used to assure that vital medical equipment is periodically inspected and maintained, and that defective equipment identified by the National Patient Safety Office as having safety issues is remediated according to manufacturer requirements. Even a brief interruption of maintenance activity to VA equipment could impair VA’s mission, to the point of cancelling medical care in cases where the availability of medical equipment could not be guaranteed to be safe or available. IBM Maximo provides the VA with the capability to reduce the risk of system outages, degraded system performance, and reliability of interfaces with other core systems.

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, the undersigned VA technical representative determined that limited competition is available among resellers for brand name IBM Maximo Application Suite software subscription upgrade and technical support. 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, FAR 16.505(b)(2)(ii)(D), and FAR 16.505(a)(4)(iii), the award notice for this action will be synopsized on the Contract Opportunities website and this justification will be made publicly available within 14 days of award.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: To remove or overcome barriers to competition in future acquisitions for this requirement, the program office will continue to perform market research to consider and ascertain if any other sources can provide these software license subscriptions and associated technical support in the future. Specifically, the Government will continue to investigate alternatives to IBM Maximo Application Suite software subscription upgrade and technical support that may be compatible with the current infrastructure. VA is also currently conducting an assessment across the VA Enterprise to determine the best product or mix of products for use by supply chain personnel.

8. Market Research:

Market research was conducted for this effort in June 2024 and is ongoing. The results have shown that a new supply chain solution may replace or supplement Maximo in the coming years. This assessment includes researching other similar solutions from alternative vendors, including products such as ServiceNOW’s Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) product, Eptura Corp.’s Archibus software, and Nuvolo software. It was determined that none of these alternative vendor software and maintenance products can meet VA’s interoperability requirements within calendar year 2025 or avoid the duplication of time and cost as outlined in Section 5 of this justification. Nor can any alternate vendors meet the Government’s requirements and be compatible with VA’s existing IBM Maximo software proprietary source code to perform the needed maintenance and support services. Only IBM or its authorized resellers have access to the source code and can provide the necessary support to continue integrating updates into the system without causing a break in service, which would cause medical equipment availability issues and negatively affect patient care for the Veterans.

Based on the market research, the Government's technical experts have determined that only IBM Maximo Application Suite brand-name software and technical support can meet and maintain VA's current supply chain system of record needs at this time.

Additionally, the Government’s technical experts conducted market research in July 2024 by utilizing the NASA SEWP Market Research Request For Information (RFI) Tool. The search results identified seven IBM resellers that appeared to have the technical capability of providing the needed goods and services, of which: one is a Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) vendor; one is a HubZone Small Business vendor; five are Small Business vendors. Therefore, there is reasonable expectation that competition exists on the NASA SEWP V GWAC for the subject procurement effort. This information has been filed within the contracting records.

Furthermore, market research was conducted in October 2024 by issuing a RFI on the NASA SEWP V GWAC to determine whether the brand name IBM Maximo Application Suite software subscription upgrade and technical support is available amongst NASA SEWP V GWAC holders. The RFI results proved that the software and technical support is available; however, the two responses from the small businesses indicated that when they reached out to the Original Equipment Manufacturer (IBM) for service availability and pricing information, they were instructed to advise the Government of the following: “No bid can be issued for this site because the RFQ has a small business set-aside box checked. The RFQ must be set to full and open. Please tell the customer to amend the RFQ to Full/Open. IBM legal has determined that IBM software is not an eligible product for small business set aside. For SEWP solicitations, Non Manufacturing Rule (NMR) isn't applicable but the guidance on small biz set aside still holds because of a requirement for reseller value-added services greater than or equal to 15% of the contract value. Hence, this requires that for either IBM direct or through an IBM reseller, there is a need for the RFQ to be set to Open/Full in order for a quote to be offered.”

Therefore, IBM will not provide pricing information at all, if the effort is posted as a small business set-aside. With this information, it confirms that the requirement is not eligible for small business set-aside.

Accordingly, this requirement must be set to allow fair opportunity to all business sizes in order to procure the required brand name software and services. As a result, there is a reasonable expectation that limited competition exists on the NASA SEWP V GWAC for the brand name IBM Maximo.

9. Other Facts: None.

Approval

In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of IBM Maximo Application Suite software subscription upgrade and technical support 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.