BOBJ_Brand_Name_Redacted.pdf

DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH & HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services 7500 Security Boulevard, Mail Stop B3-30-03 Baltimore, Maryland 21244-1850

CLASS JUSTIFICATION FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY

PREPARED AND APPROVED IN ACCORDANCE WITH FAR 16.505(b)(2)(ii)(B) &

OAGM POLICY - JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL FOR OTHER THAN FULL AND

OPEN COMPETITION (JOFOC) AND LIMITED SOURCE JUSTIFICATIONS (LSJ)

1. Identification of the agency and contracting activity

a. Federal agency and contracting activity: Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (DHHS, CMS)

b. Sponsoring organization: Office of Information Systems (CMS/OIS)

c. Project Officer information:

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

a. Acquisition purpose and objectives:

The purpose of this class of acquisitions is to acquire “Business Objects (BOBJ)”-brand software and software maintenance during Fiscal Years (FYs) 2015 through

2019. BOBJ is a suite of software tools used for business intelligence (BI) applications. The class of acquisitions contemplated in this document includes purchases of new software products to CMS, as well as additional quantities of products already in use. Further, it includes the purchase of software maintenance.

Software maintenance is similar to an extended warranty, wherein the software publisher provides access to the latest version of the software including security patches and upgrades produced over a period of time determined by the length of the maintenance period, generally one year. Technical support is also provided.

Class justification and approval is appropriate because the precise quantity and mix of

BOBJ products needed over the course of time cannot be accurately forecasted due to frequent changes in the number of users, reports and availability of new products. As a result, it is not possible to accurately estimate in advance the number of contract actions necessary to address such needs. Further, the producer of BOBJ products, SAP SE (SAP), would not offer product pricing beyond 2016 in response to requests for information submitted as part of market research, though the agency’s needs for such maintenance will extend beyond that period of time with no change in the underlying rationale for inclusion of a brand name specification in the solcitations to procure such maintenance.

b. Project background:

i. Project title: Business Objects (BOBJ) Software & Software Maintenance

ii. Project description:

One or more procurements of BOBJ-brand software licenses and software maintenance. BOBJ-brand software and software maintenance are commercial items available both on the open market as well as through Government Wide

Acquisition Contracts (GWACs) and Federal Supply Schedule (FSS) 70.

Previous procurements of these items by CMS in recent history have included both FSS-based and, most recently, an open market purchase order awarded to a small business which included specification of BOBJ-brand name items. Going forward during the period addressed by this document, CMS expects to place one or more orders for BOBJ software products and maintenance using NASA’s

“SEWP” GWAC. In so doing, CMS expects to use the ordering instructions established by NASA to obtain fair opportunity and compete such orders among resellers of BOBJ products. Furthermore, CMS issued a formal Request for

Information (RFI) amongst SEWP contractors to validate this approach. In response, CMS confirmed the availability of resellers capable of meeting the agency’s needs through this acquisition approach. Additionally, no comments were received from industry relative to the inclusion of the BOBJ-brand name requirement in the RFI.

The first acquisition of the class described in this document is expected to include a base requirement for upgraded software products, along with the first year of software maintenance, as well as one option year to extend that maintenance. The software products and their corresponding quantity are illustrated in the following table:

Description Qty

Business Objects BI Suites (25 Conccurrent users) 8

Business Objects BI Suite Named user 50

iii. Requirement type:

Support services (non-research & development)

Supplies/equipment

Information technology (IT)

Other (specify): ____________________

iv. Type of action:

New requirement

Follow-on

Other (specify):

v. Proposed contract/order type:

Firm-fixed-price

Time and materials

Indefinite delivery (specify whether indefinite quantity, definite quantity, or requirements): ___________

Other (specify):

vi. Acquisition identification number: APP# 150222

vii. Total estimated dollar value and performance/delivery period:

The total estimated value of the class of acquisitions addressed by this document is $______. This includes all OIS-sponsored requirements for BOBJ-brand software and associated maintenance purchased between Fiscal Years (FY) 2015 and 2019. The expected award date of the first procurement of the class is

November 2014.

4. Identification of the exception to fair opportunity (see 16.505(b)(2)) and the supporting rationale, including a demonstration that the proposed contractor’s unique qualifications or the nature of the acquisition requires use of the exception cited. If the contracting officer uses the logical follow-on exception, the rationale shall describe why the relationship between the initial order and the follow-on is logical (e.g., in terms of scope, period of performance, or value).

a. Acquisition authority: 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 (per FAR 16.505 (b)(2)(i)(B) and

16.505(a)(4)).

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

i. Name and address of the proposed contractor(s):

SAP SE

Dietmar-Hopp-Allee 16

WALLDORF, 69190

Germany http://www.sap.com/index.html

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

The nature of the class of acquisitions addressed by this document includes one or more procurements of BOBJ-brand software licenses and software maintenance.

BOBJ is a suite of tools used for Business Intelligence (BI) purposes. BI is an extremely complex system used in the development, validation and production http://www.sap.com/index.html environments at CMS. BOBJ software tools are integrated with several complex and large IT systems/ environments including, but not limited to, the Integrated

Data Repository (IDR). BOBJ provides integrated reporting and analysis capabilities, including dashboard production, for CMS’ large database environment. The reporting and information supplied by BOBJ is essential to many of the agency’s operations. Without it, activities such as Program Integrity and Fraud and Abuse would be adversely impacted.

The use of any other brand name products for these applications is either (1) not possible because there is no other product that performs the same functions as the

BOBJ product currently operated by the agency or else (2) unacceptable because if another product were used, the cost, risk and time needed to re-design the associated architecture and related systems which leverage these products places would offset any potential cost and/or performance benefit from use of the alternate product.

Switching to another comparable Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) product would require re-engineering of the ~17,500 reports designed and operated using

BOBJ. This would include extensive data conversions and training for the end users on operation of the new BI tool. There would also be a need to increase the server capacity to support for the additional workload. The complexity of re-engineering the 17,500+ reports is significant but not insurmountable. The estimated cost of such effort is ~$ and it would take 2-3 years to implement and transition to another BI tool. Furthermore, the transition to another BI product would not be seamless as there would undoubtedly be problems with the data conversion as well as the loss of productivity while re-training end users.

As described above, migration away from BOBJ would introduce significant technical risk to those operations. It would not only impact how the CMS Data

Centers interact with one another, but would also impact how several critical systems have been deployed to operate within the CMS IT environment. Given the criticality of these BOBJ products in the infrastructure and the absence of a compelling cost and/or performance benefit to justify undertaking the significant effort associated with swapping out key pieces of the infrastructure when they are currently stable and performing well, there is no reasonable expectation that any brand name product other than Business Objects could constitute the best value to

CMS.

5. A determination by the contracting officer that the anticipated cost to the Government will be fair and reasonable.

The Contracting Officer will determine that the anticipated cost to the Government is fair and reasonable for each acquisition within the class addressed by this document prior to the award of each such acquisition.

6. Any other facts supporting the justification: None

7. A statement of the actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers that led to the exception to fair opportunity before any subsequent acquisition for the supplies or services is made:

For the reasons stated above, no such actions are currently anticipated.