A03_-_Redacted_J&A_over_$150K.pdf

Control No: JA-Adel-18-113

Contractor: Parsons Government Services, Inc.

Supply/Service: Service

JUSTIFICATION REVIEW DOCUMENT

FAR PART 6 JUSTIFICATION AND APPROVAL FOR OTHER THAN

FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION

Programs/Equipment: Extension to W911QX-17-C-0037, Computing and Network Security Support Services (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Combat Systems, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance [C5ISR] Transition award)

Authority: 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(2) as implemented by FAR Part 6.302-2 -- Unusual and Compelling Urgency.

Amount: $666,900.92

REDACTED

Contracting Officer: Mr. Phillip J. Amador Contracting Officer Email: phillip.j.amador.civ@mail.mil

REDACTED

Reviews: I have reviewed this justification and find it adequate to support other than full and open competition.

mailto:phillip.j.amador.civ@mail.mil

Contractor: Parsons Government Services Inc.

FAR Part 6 Justification and Approval for Other than Full and Open Competition

1. Contracting Activity: Adelphi Contracting Division, Army Contracting Command- Aberdeen Proving Ground (ACC-APG) Soldier, Chemical, Research & Test (SCRT), REDACTED

2. Description of Action: The United States (U.S.) Army Research Laboratory (ARL), Computational & Information Sciences Directorate (CISD) requests an extension to contract W911QX-17-C-0037 with Parsons Government Services Inc., located at 100 West Walnut Street, Pasadena, California 91124-0001 (CAGE Code: 1BVK6, DUNS Number:

006908511). The Government projects award for December 2017 and fiscal year 2017 Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDT&E) funds will be used.

_X_ An acquisition plan is not required because this procurement either does not meet the threshold at Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement 207.103(d)(i), or is an R&D acquisition and does not meet the definition of services in 10 U.S.C. 2330(c)(2).

3. Description of Supplies/Services: This request is for an extension to contract W911QX-17-C-0037 for 3 weeks which provides for the transition of the research, development, test, evaluation, production and fielding support services for Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) services provided to the Army under a Navy C4ISR award while the RDRL-CI’s Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Combat Systems, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Multiple Award Task Order Contract (MATOC) undergoes Source Selection. This contract extension will provide the services required by RDRL-CI while the transition from the Navy award is being completed. The C5ISR effort includes additional requirements from the C4ISR requirements being performed such as new areas of research and development for Computational Sciences, Information Sciences, and Network Sciences.

Extension Period: 30 December 2017 to 20 January 2018 Value: $666,900.92

TOTAL ESTIMATED VALUE:

$666,690.92

4. Authority Cited: 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(2), as implemented by FAR 6.302-2, Unusual and Compelling Urgency.

5. Reason for Authority Cited: Contract W911QX-17-C-0037 was awarded on 08/29/2017 to provide RDRL-CI with Computing and Network Security Support (CNSS) services due to the delay in awarding the C5ISR Multiple Award Task Order Contract (MATOC) which was finalizing the Source Selection evaluation and moving towards the award review. This extension request is required in order to ensure that RDRL-CI continues to receive CNSS services while the MATOC award is being finalized.

The Government estimated that no more than four (4) months of services would be required and issued W911QX-17-C-0037 with a one (1) month base period, and included three (1) one (1) month option periods to allow for a possible total of four (4) months performance to allow for the completion of the Source Selection and award review. Due to unanticipated delays, the C5ISR MATOC award date estimated at time of the W911QX-17-C-0037 award will not be met. The Government anticipated that the award of the C5ISR MATOC would meet the estimated award date and it was not until after the Award Review process was underway that it was realized that there were some errors during the planning phase and that a contingency may be required to ensure no lapse in service is experienced. As mentioned above, there were many incidents that attributed to the delays during the SSEB phase and award review phase. A breakdown of the more significant incidents follows:

(1) The Source Selection Evaluation was completed and sent for legal review on 10/05/2017 with an anticipated completion of 10/12/2017. The Virtual Contracting Enterprise (VCE) Acquisition Source Selection Interactive Support (ASSIST) Tool experienced an outage and legal was unable to complete the preliminary review until 10/11/2017. The award forecast date of 11/01/2017 was still expected to be achievable.

(2) On 10/17/2017 preliminary legal review comments for the Source Selection Evaluation were addressed and accepted. The Contract Award Peer Review was initiated on 10/25/2017 for local division review with an anticipated completion date of 11/01/2017.

(3) On 11/13/2017, the Government revised the award forecast date to 12/01/2017-

12/15/2017 due to the delays in the Contract Award Peer Review.

(4) The local division peer review resulted in numerous areas to clarify to ensure the contract award file content accurately and clearly reflects the Source Selection Evaluation results. Local peer review was completed on 11/20/2017 and submitted to the Office of the Principal Assistant Responsible for Contracting (OPARC-PARC), ACC-APG on 11/22/2017 with an anticipated completion date of 12/04/2017. The award forecast date of was updated to a firm date of 12/15/2017 which was still expected to be achievable.

(5) On 11/22/2017, the Government initiated planning for a possible extension to W911QX-17-C-0037 due to the aforementioned delays. On 11/30/2017, preliminary OPARC review was completed. The OPARC informed that due to staffing levels, the complete review would not be provided until 12/04/2017. The award forecast date of 12/15/2017 was still expected to be achievable.

(6) On 12/05/2017, the OPARC informed that due to computer outages, the complete review is estimated to be completed by 12/07/2017. The award forecast date of 12/15/2017 was still expected to be achievable.

(7) On 12/07/2017, the OPARC informed that the complete review has been further delayed, and an estimated completion date of 12/11/2017. The Government revised the award forecast date to 12/22/2017.

(8) On 12/12/2017, the OPARC completed the Contract Award Review which resulted in numerous areas to clarify to ensure the contract award file content accurately and clearly reflects the Source Selection Evaluation results. On 12/18/2017, the OPARC concurred with the response to the Contract Award Review and is scheduling the PARC Award Presentation. The current award forecast date of 12/22/2017 is still expected to be achievable. The extension is essential to allow transition between contract W911QX-17-C-0037 and C5ISR MATOC award.

A lapse in support in these services would significantly impact RDRL-CI’s critical role as a Cyber Security Service Provider (CSSP) which ultimately increases the risk of a cybersecurity breach at ARL and its Army and DoD Customers. Given the sensitive nature of the information that these information systems hold, successful cyberattacks could pose a significant risk to the national security of the United States. As such, it is important that the Government takes steps in order to further mitigate cyber risks.

Without direct and uninterrupted contractor support in this arena, the real time cyberattacks would be accomplished without identification, notification, response and recovery. Systems would be allowed to exist at a lower security posture without notice, increasing the realistic opportunities to compromise them without interception. Looking further out, this delay in capabilities would have a ripple affect across the entire DoD and the harm to national security is immeasurable. ARL RDRL-CI recognizes that mission success is defined by ARL's CSSP ability to REDACTED ARL must sustain operations and defenses before, during, and after an attack by reducing the attack surface, continually improving defensive cyberspace operations, and effectively commanding and controlling Cyber. Without CSSP services, DoD CSSP customers cannot connect to a DoDIN, thus disrupting their ability to execute their mandated mission. Many of these DoD CSSP subscribers provide direct Warfighter support and any interruption in these CSSP services provided under the current contract effort would lead to adverse effects to the Warfighter and nation in general.

Furthermore, a lapse in contract support provided under the subject effort will significantly degrade and delay CISD’s ability to deliver other Army critical warfighting capabilities including: Dominance in C4ISR on the battlefield through advanced technologies in Dynamic Optical Networking, Software Defined Networking, new Computer Architecture Designs, Tactical Computing, Extreme Scale Computational Frameworks, and Network Modeling, and 2) Life-saving ballistic protection technologies against current and future threats enabled through Multi-Scale Modeling Research and materials by design.

As the Army’s laboratory for Research and Development, ARL provides critical war fighting capabilities in support of deployed Warfighters and provides technologies, assessments, and analyses for tomorrow’s systems, to the Army acquisition community and other customers. ARL guides fundamental research that is expected to significantly impact short to medium term capabilities as well as the capabilities available to the Army of 2040 and beyond. RDRL-CI plays a substantial cross-cutting role as the ARL lead for Computation Sciences, Information Sciences, and Network Sciences. Contract support provided under this effort has played a significant role in RDRL-CI’s success in these core areas.

In Computational Architectures, RDRL-CI is conducting research in the development and application of new and novel computational hardware and associated software that use vastly different methods of executing tasks. These newer processors are part of the computational sciences campaign in ARL, and as such are being inserted on technology insertion roadmaps across the lab. These REDACTED Any delays to these efforts will result in at least a full year of delays to project deliverables targeted for transition to DARPA, TARDEC, and CERDEC. As these technologies are not commercial in nature, any delay in delivery REDACTED, and hence new processors could be delayed up to two (2) years. The carryover impact is pervasively negative since that means all systems being deployed cannot take advantage of the reduced power processing, and even large supercomputing centers maintained by the DoD (ARL hosts one of these sites) cannot leverage these technologies which would be putting U.S. efforts behind international competition.

Directly related to RDRL-CI’s research in tactical applications, Network Sciences covers a broad range of theoretical and applied research and development areas including secure tactical ad-hoc mobile networks to support battlefield communications. Secure and reliable communication on the battlefield is imperative for mission success but is technically challenging due to the dynamic and unpredictable circumstances. RDRL- CI Government researchers, and the services provided by the researchers under the subject award, investigate these areas using REDACTED to provide our Soldiers with secure and reliable information. Current efforts are directed toward ensuring that secure communication lines are available. In some cases, these lines are either on or off; there is no degradation scaling. Loss of signal means that Soldiers have no access to intel or other situational awareness, and hence they are directly placed into harm’s way. The loss or interruption of this R&D support provided under the subject effort would significantly reduce RDRL-CI’s ability to investigate solutions for these mission critical applications. Without these applications, the Soldier would be left without accurate and time critical data to conduct their mission which could cause serious damage to the Warfighter and Government operations in general.

As the contractor currently performing the CNSS Services for RDRL-CI, Parsons Government Services, Inc. is the only firm postured to perform the required work within the very short time frame provided above. The proposed extension to the subject contract has to be awarded before the current order expires on 29 Dec. 2017 to ensure no lapse in these critical services provided to RDRL-CI. Parsons has been providing these services to REDACTED through the SPAWAR C4ISR contract and has been performing under W911QX-17-C-0037 to ensure there is no lapse in these critical services. Parsons’s has a full complement of employees capable of working on day one as the current service provider.

Maintaining these services during this short period of transition is the least disruptive path for the Government. Failure to continue the current effort at this time has the potential to jeopardize not only the technical areas described above but also future ARL funding if ARL and Army execution goals are not met. Awarding this short transitional contract to Parsons also significantly reduces risk to the Government as the current personnel have the appropriate level of security REDACTED, training, credentials, and specialized experience to continue operations without a significant negative impact.

Therefore, it is determined that Parsons Government Services, Inc. is the only source capable of meeting the requirements for this transition contract.

6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: No efforts to obtain competition was sought as this was an Urgent requirement as provided above. In accordance with FAR 5.202(a)(2), this contract action was not synopsized given that it was made under all the conditions described in FAR 6.302-2 as detailed in section 5 above. These services were required to ensure that no lapse in these critical services was experienced by RDRL-CI which would have impacted the various areas identified in section 5 above. Parsons Government Services, Inc. was the only vendor capable of responding to this request in such a short time frame given Parsons is currently performing the duties under the W911QX-17-C-0037 contract.

7. Actions to Increase Competition: No additional requirements are anticipated for this effort. The C5ISR MATOC award will capture all requirements for RDRL-CI’s future C5ISR requirements once awarded, anticipated award date of 12/22/2017. ARL’s C5ISR Requirements under solicitation W911QX-17-R-0008 are currently undergoing PARC Award Review as a result of a competitive full and open solicitation. Any future C5ISR requirement will be solicited through the MATOC procedures. This award extension is estimated to only be required for one (1) month to allow for continued performance which will transition to both the C5ISR task order awards.

8. Market Research: Market research and evaluation was reviewed for the W911QX-17- R-0008 C5ISR effort which was conducted between 10 May 2016 and 17 August 2017 by REDACTED, a Computer Scientist within RDRL-CI with over 15 years of experience within the field. REDACTED reviewed the potential sources identified during that market research to determine if any other sources would be capable of providing the required services in an urgent request. It was determined that only Parsons would be capable of:

(a.) responding to an urgent request for services, (b.) fulfilling the requirements to include providing personnel that have the appropriate level of security clearances, and (c) ensuring no lapse in service is experienced, and they are currently providing these services to RDRL-CI through the subject contract award and there is no need for on ramping of a new contractor. It is in the best interest of the Government to stay with Parsons for this transition which allows for immediate continuation of services.

9. Interested Sources: Not applicable. The contract action will not be synopsized in accordance with FAR 5.202(a)(2). This award will be issued on the basis of Urgency to ensure that no lapse in these critical services was experienced by RDRL-CI which would have impacted the various areas identified in section 5 above. Although it is understood that various vendors may be qualified to perform these services, no other source was determined to provide the services required to be continued without a lapse in service in such a rapid timeframe. Since Parsons is providing these services under the subject contract award, they were determined to be capable of: (a.) responding to an urgent request for services, (b.) fulfilling the requirements to include providing personnel that have the appropriate level of security clearances, and (c) ensure no lapse in service is experienced.

10. Other Facts:

a. Procurement History

(1) Contract: W911QX-17-C-0037 Contractor: Parsons Government Services, Inc.

Award Date: 08/29/2017

(2) Competitive Status: Not competed.

(3) Authority previously cited if less than full and open competition was used: 10 U.S.C. 2304(c)(2), as implemented by FAR 6.302-2, Unusual and Compelling Urgency.

(4) If a justification was prepared to support the procurement made before this one, a summary of the contents of paragraph 7 of the justification for that procurement and an explanation of the results. Actions to Increase Competition under the J&A for the current contract stated that future requirements will be solicited through MATOC procedures which is still the case.

(6) An explanation of any unusual patterns that may be revealed by the history, e.g., several consecutive, urgent buys. Only one other action which is detailed in section 5.

(7) If a justification was prepared to support the procurement made before this one, briefly describe the circumstances justifying the procurement and whether there have been any significant changes. The current contract, which this effort will extend, was required due to unexpected delays and unsuccessful planning. This lead to the Government not meeting the anticipated award date as the Source Selection Evaluation was being conducted. There have been no significant changes.

b. Other Facts: This J&A is due to the award evaluation taking longer than estimated.

The delay is due to various factors as identified in section 5, such as; the nature of award review process, etc.

11. Technical Certification: I certify that the supporting data under my cognizance which are included in the justification are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Signer’s Title: Computer Scientist

12. Requirements Certification: I certify that the supporting data under my cognizance which are included in the justification are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Signer’s Title: Acting Branch Chief

13. Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated cost or price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable.

Detailed documentation and justification of cost/price reasonableness will be disclosed in the official contract file to include a cost analysis and comparison of the proposed price with prices found reasonable on previous purchases.

This determination will be made using the following:

_X_ Cost analysis __ Price analysis __ Should cost

__ IGCE

__ Audit:

__ Other:

As a part of this basis, certified cost or pricing data:

__ Will be required.

_X_ Will not be required and the following exception applies (FAR 15.403):

__ Prices that will be agreed upon are based on adequate price competition.

__ Prices that will be agreed upon are based on prices set by law or regulation.

__ A commercial item is being acquired.

__ A waiver has been granted by the head of the contracting activity (HCA) in accordance with DFARS PGI 215.403-1.

__ The contract action is a modification to a contract or subcontract for commercial item(s).

_X_ The estimated cost of the contract action is less than the threshold for certified cost or pricing data.

14. Contracting Officer Certification: I certify that this justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Approval Based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the procurement of the 3 week extension to contract W911QX-17-C-0037 for Computing and Network Security Support Services (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Combat Systems, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance [C5ISR] Transition award) on an other than full and open competition basis pursuant to the authority of 10 U.S.C.2304(c)(2), subject to availability of funds, and provided that the services or supplies herein described have otherwise been authorized for acquisition.

(End of J&A)