FAU_RFI_Review_BJ_5.16 AJS 5.23 v2.docx

Disclaimer:

FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION

FINANCE DIVISION | PROCUREMENT SECTION

Version 4.0

THIS NOTICE IS FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL OR QUOTE. IT DOES NOT CONSTITUTE A SOLICITATION AND SHALL NOT BE CONSTRUED AS A COMMITMENT BY THE GOVERNMENT. RESPONSES IN ANY FORM ARE NOT OFFERS AND THE GOVERNMENT IS UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO AWARD A CONTRACT AS A RESULT OF THIS ANNOUNCEMENT. NO FUNDS ARE AVAILABLE TO PAY FOR PREPARATION OF RESPONSES TO THIS ANNOUNCEMENT. ANY INFORMATION SUBMITTED BY RESPONDENTS TO THIS TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION IS STRICTLY VOLUNTARY.

Introduction:

The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Criminal Investigative Division (CID), Financial Crimes Section (FCS), Forensic Accountant Unit (FAU) is requesting information and conducting research by process of Request for Information (RFI) in the area of Data Conversion, Data Manipulation, and Optical Character Recognition (OCR).

Background:

The United States Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, forensic accountants are responsible for the review and analysis of financial documentary evidence obtained during the course of an investigation. The most common types of documents received are account statements and transactional images from financial institutions (banks, credit unions, etc.).

These transaction images may include deposit tickets, checks received for deposit, checks written from the account, and wire transfer activity. These documents are received in either paper or PDF formats and are not original copies. In some instances, the documents received are of fair or low visual quality.

Depending on the investigation, forensic accountants may receive multiple years’ worth of financial documents in multiple formats including bank statement and transaction information exported into spreadsheets. Extracting this information requires bulk processing of large volumes of documents.

Users of this software will access it on or from computers operating on the Windows 11 operating system, additional restrictions are listed below.

The data is then analyzed to create reports and communicate findings to others on the investigative team. Because of the complexity of the data obtained, automating the process using business intelligence tools would be ideal.

Due to the nature of these investigations and content sensitivity, all documents must be processed in/on FBI controlled US Government network environments, such as, an FBI enclave within GOV cloud or FBI native networks.

Objectives:

This RFI is intended to help the agency make informed acquisition decisions to the following:

· Evaluate the current market offerings and the best suited technology for current and future investigative needs;

· Identify the needs of the users and risk/benefits of solutions;

· Identify and mitigate any potential barriers to competition, and

· Determine industry data and information needs to support proposal preparations.

The agency objective is to acquire a new software technology from an established provider with an existing enterprise offering that can meet the following:

1. Offering state-of-the-art technology that captures data from documents containing computer font and handwritten details;

2. Providing artificial intelligence and machine learning capability to improve character recognition;

3. Executing performance excellence in customer support, technological advancements, comprehensive analytics, and providing solutions that will add significant value and cost effectiveness;

4. Supporting agency deadlines and faster solution development to meet the complex needs of the agency;

5. Facilitating requirements of data capture and analytics from various documents to include, but not limited to financial institutions statements, credit card statements, deposit images, check images, industry forms, and business forms, and

6. Processing large volumes of data with the ability to parse unique identifiers.

Required Submittal Information Requested:

1. Capabilities and Qualifications:

a. Describe the name of all your company’s operations;

b. Describe the methodology used to measure your company’s performance standards and quality assurance;

c. Describe how client complaints and issues are addressed and resolved;

d. Does your company have the resources to support a large enterprise agency, and

e. Does the solution support multiple users working in the same file at the same time?

2. Data Capture and Analytic Solutions:

a. Can your solution identify and convert handwriting into text?

b. Can your solution automatically identify and covert check images?

c. Can your solution convert check images from multiple layout(s)/format(s) (i.e. four checks per page, 12 checks per page and more)?

d. Can your solution automatically match/link the check image to the associated transaction within the corresponding financial statement?

e. Can your solution promote data provenance by linking embedding images or files in the output, such as images or charts in an MS Excel spreadsheet?

f. Can your solution link specific source locations from PDFs to corresponding transaction in the output; such as a row in an MS Excel spreadsheet?

g. Can your solution automatically identify and accurately correlate transaction from documents that may hold multiple accounts or account types?

h. Can your solution parse vendor names from the transaction description text into a separate column?

i. Can your solution identify the transaction location and other data from the statement description into a separate column?

j. Does your solution have a page or data processing limit?

k. Does your solution offer multi-page handling?

l. Can your solution integrate included data analytics (i.e. total deposit/withdrawal amounts and transaction occurrences) to streamline workflow?

m. Can the user customize the output based on specific/situational needs?

n. What other types of documents can your solution support?

o. Does your solution require additional OCR programs to operate?

p. Does your solution offer integrated data analytics and visualization tools (i.e. charts, graphs)?

q. How does your solution assist or promote verification, accuracy and completeness of outputs?

r. Can your solution identify and indicate transposed or incorrectly parsed data?

s. Can your solution assign unique identifiers to each transaction?

t. Does your solution have any limitations or the inability to support any and all financial institutions or financial documents encountered?

u. Does your solution require the use of templates for document identification, or is another method used? What method?

v. How does your solution handle new financial institution statement formats or unique documents?

w. Does your solution capture both data from structured and unstructured documents?

x. Does your solution provide redaction features?

y. Does your solution provide financial analysis models such as flow of funds, transaction analysis, Benford’s Law, Beneish’s M-Score, etc.?

3. Physical and Access Security:

a. Does your solution have an ‘off-line’ version? Or is it a server/service/SaaS or cloud-based solution?

b. Will your organization provide all information required by the agency’s security components to certify and accredit its use?

c. What certifications does your organization have?

d. Can your solution be deployed as an on-site solution at a Government location?

e. Can your solution be deployed on a customers cloud environment?

4. Client Service and Support:

a. What type of client support/help desk access is included with your software?

b. How is client help and support handled?

c. What services are available with the solutions?

d. How are your services packaged (Firm-Fixed Price, Labor Hours, other)?

e. What labor categories are used for your service features?

f. What type of training is provided with your solution, in-house or remote and for how long?

5. Licensing and Product Structure:

a. Is your product provided via license or subscription?

b. What license models exist for your product (i.e. annual license, multi-year license, perpetual license?

c. Are your licensing models tied to named user, floating license, enterprise licensing?

d. What is the typical cost for each of the licensing models?

Submittal Information:

This RFI is intended to refresh the FBI’s previously conducted market research via RFI under the title Market Research for Optical Character Recognition and Data Conversion that was posted to industry via NASA SEWP and SAM.GOV in April of 2023. If your company responded to the previous RFI and there are no changes to your products information per the above requested information, please provide a response on company letterhead indicating that your company stands on its previous response and that you remain interested in any future acquisition considerations for this effort. The historical data will be used to inform the government on industry capabilities.

It is requested that interested businesses that did not respond to the previous RFI submit to the Contracting Office a brief capabilities package using Word, Excel or PDF searchable format 8 ½ x 11 page size, no more than 20 pages in length, single spaced, 12 point font, one-inch margins, Times New Roman Font, demonstrating ability to meet the FBI’s requirements. The documentation must address, at a minimum, the following:

· Company Name, Company Address, Company Business Size, and Point-of-Contact (POC) name, phone number, fax number, and e-mail address

· Company profile to include number of employees, annual revenue history, office location(s), CAGE Code, DUNS number, and a statement regarding current small/large business status

· Qualifications, if applicable, as a Small, Small Disadvantaged, Small Disadvantaged Veteran Owned Small Business, Women-Owned, 8(a), Hub Zone or Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business Concern

· System for Award Management (SAM) registered NAICS codes

· If the vendor is a small business, an explanation of the vendor’s ability to perform at least 50% of the tasking described in this SOW

· The type of work the vendor has performed in the past in support of the same or similar requirement to include the type of contract and method of contracting (GSA, GWAC, other contracting vehicle)

· Vendor participation in any Government-wide Acquisition Contracts (GWAC) or General Services Administration (GSA) schedules which may be utilized for the contract

· The specific technical skills the vendor possesses which ensures capability to meet the objectives and requirements

The capability package shall be sent via email to bmjames@fbi.gov. Submissions must be received no later than 4pm Eastern Time on June 14, 2024. Questions or comments regarding this notice may be addressed to Contracting Specialist (CS) Brandon James via email bmjames@fbi.gov by June 3, 2024. All correspondence shall take place in writing. No phone calls will be accepted regarding this RFI. Feedback regarding your response will not be provided. The Government reserves the right to engage responding companies with clarification questions or direct follow-up on product capabilities or information to further understand a response. This outreach will be at the Government’s discretion.

This RFI is for planning purposes only and shall not be considered as a request for proposal or an obligation on the part of the FBI to acquire and products or services. No entitlement to payment of direct or indirect costs or charges by the FBI will arise because of contractor submission of responses to this RFI or the FBI’s use of such information. The FBI reserves the right to reject, in whole or in part, any contractor’s input resulting from this RFI. Responses to this RFI will not be returned. All questions regarding the RFI shall be in writing prior to submission date. The cost of responding to this RFI shall be exclusively borne by the contractor and no costs will be reimbursed by the FBI.

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