Workbook Q_A.xlsx

Q&A

2. Does a Tribal or Alaskan Native Corporation receive a Prime preference if also Total SB?

3. Given the pending virtual site visit, would the Government consider extending the Quote due date from July 13, if the site visit and documents are not received and/or conducted by 6/26? We would prefer where possible to have at least two complete business weeks to review the documentation requested here and to conduct the virtual site visit, and to engineer a solution, in order to price.

4. Please confirm this is a Price only quote consistent only with FAR's Instructions to Offerors (52.212-1), with no Factors.

5. Can the government please provide/update the maps/floor plans to show exact coverage areas?

6. Please provide a list of all government furnished equipment (GFE) that will be available throughout the engagement.

7. Please provide a link or copy of IHS DIS SOP-09-36 – Wireless Network Security Standards.

8. Do all 5 locations need to be on the same Virtual network for data access?

9. Is a Security (RMF) package required?

10. In the published Q&A the government states an RMF would be preferable. Obtaining an ATO through RMF is extremely labor intensive, can take 18-24 months and cost in excess of the installation cost of the network. Does the government require an ATO for this RFQ?

11. As 52.225-1 applies, in what instances would the Government accept the exceptions provided for Foreign End Products? Are Offers to list every product that is a Free Trade Agreement Country End Product in Reps & Certs?

12. Is FIPS implementation required or does the equipment simply have to be ABLE to do FIPS?

13. SOW states "Data in transit from authorized users on a WLAN to authorized users on a wired LAN must be filitered through an appropriate filitering device (e.g., a firewall)." Will the government supply this filtering device (e.g., firewall) and if not can the government provide a firewall specifications required to maintain existing LAN security?

14. Would WLAN authorized users passing through a WLAN controller provide sufficient filtering to maintain existing LAN security?

15. Is there space in the existing racks or are new racks needed? If new racks are needed does the IHS prefer call of floor racks?

16. Is space available in all risers between floors in all buildings?

17. Is sufficient space avialable in cable ways and trays for cable distribution (if needed) throughout the buildings and between floors?

1. No

2. No

3. Pending - Due date extended to 7/20/20

4. Correct

5. Will provide at a later date. Sent on 6/26/20

6. Providing equipment is on you. You are providing IN house WiFI network, and IHS will provide the connectivity to IHS circuit.

7. Will provide. Sent on 6/26/20 and posted on 7/5/20

8. They do not.

9. Is this mean Risk Management Framework? If so, it's preferable if you can.

10. ISSO will do the RMF. No Authorization To Operate (ATO) is required.

11. There should be no need for an exception as all products can be sold in substantial quantities in a commerical marketplace and are commerical items. Yes, Offers are to list all products that is a Free Trade Agreement Country End product in Reps & Certs.

12. Network segmentation by VLAN will accomplish this task, there is no need for a seperate firewall.

13. See answer above.

14. See #12 answer.

15. Nashville - Rack space available; Catawba - No rack, equipment is mounted on shelf in server room, shelf space is available; TransAm - Rack space available; Unity Main Building - Rack space is available; Unity Butler Building - Rack space is available; Manlius - Shelves will be provided by the site; Mashpee - Admin building - no rack, equipment is mounted on shelf. Shelf space available; Dental Building - Rack space available; Medical Building - No rack, equipment is mounted on shelf. Shelf space available.

16. No space may be an issure at Unity Healing Center.

17. There is no specific answer on this. It will have to be confirmed at each site to move a ceiling tile, for a general answer, yes with the exception of Unity Healing Center.

18. Will containment (HEPA) carts be required in an areas?

19. Can Contractors perform uninterrupted work during normal business hours?

20. Would the government prefer to conduct quarterly WLAN scanning or have wireless intrusion detection solution provided?

21. How many users at each facility will be accessing the WLAN?

22. Does the government require content filtering? 18. Is at the discretion of the sites.

19. Out of the 7 sites only 6 locations, contractors should be able to complete work uninterrupted during normal work hours. 1 site most likely will have a schedule that will have to be worked out due to patients.

20. The ideal situation is a Wireless IDS, however in 4 of these locations, theres is no dedicated IT person on site to monitor an IDS. If centralized IHS can be stationed in Nashville for review by Area IT staff, that would be acceptable. If not, the IHS guidance is that IT staff will periodcally auidt connections (Para 2, DIS-SOP-)(-36).

21. at least 20

22. Not at this time.

Please advise:

1. Of current infrastructure to include: number and types of access points per site.

2. As to the growth over the next 3 to 5yrs.

3. As to cyber reporting requirements to address Federal RMF requirements and reporting.

4. Provide facility/plant drawings for each site.

5. Validate the addresses of all sites. 150 Professional Park, Lockport NY, 14094 does not come up on search.

6. Provide listing/level of ISP services & vendors for each site. This information must provide vendor/circuit type/speed.TSP Code/contract terms/current POP exercised.

7. Level of access is required by vendor into each facility. We currently are T3 in Veterans Affairs w/T5 eligibility & T5 in DoD and Federal. 1. There are no WiFi Access points at any of the locations submitted. All internal connections are wired.

2. Growth will be less than 10% of current office staff.

3. As to cybereporing requirement to address federal RMF requirement and reporting - The Area ISSO will be responsible for RMF reporting.

4. Will be provide at a later date. Sent via email 6/26/20

5. 150 Professional Park, Lockport NY is a new business address and may not register yet for online searching.

6. There is no Internet Service Provider as such. The internet connection for each location is provided by Verizon as part of a contract with the General Services Administration, and access is provided by the Department of Health and Human Services through a single Trusted Internet Connection (TIC).

7. Level access is not needed as a Virtual tour will be conducted in place of the site visit.

When is the site visit for this project? Due to the COVID restrictions we will not be conducting site visits. However, we are preparing a Virtual tour of each location and will be providing floor plans for each location, per email sent on June 19, 2020. Virtual tours completed on 7/6 & 7/7.

2. Virtual tours completed on 7/6 & 7/7.

a. Please provide the scale so we can properly calculate square footage.

b. Please identify large meeting areas (conference rooms, auditoriums)

c. Please identify telco closets where network switches would be installed

d. Please identify any areas that are restricted from Access point installation.

e. Please provide the wall material (drywall, brick, concrete)

2. Please provide estimated end device count per floor. (i.e. how many end devices would potentially connect to WiFi system at one time)

3. Please specify what WIFI capability is required (i.e. 802.11n, 802.11ac)

4. Does the government have a specific vendor product approved or is any WiFI vendor an option? If a specific vendor product, please provide the vendor and product.

5. Does the government already have POE switches available and have sufficient capacity for the Access points to connect to?

6. Does the government require the cabling to be installed as well or will that be provided?

7. If the government is looking for the vendor to provide the cabling and installation, does the government have any specific requirements for the cabling? If so, what are the requirements?

8. Is the WIFI for each of the 6 buildings completed isolated or is the intention that they would all be connected together via a backbone WAN so that end devices would be able to communicate between buildings? If yes, is this backbone available? Would the vendor be able to connect the wifi system to it?

9. Has any wifi survey been conducted already (predictive, passive, or active wifi surveys)? If so, please provide this with the vendors so an accurate quote can be provided. 1. Virtual tour and floor plans are forthcoming. Sent 6/26/20

2. 15 per facility w/ the exception of Lockport/TransAm. Lockport will have & additional up to 10 laptops 1 to 2 times a wk for 1hr nutrituion care class. TransAm could have 15, including bar code scanners in use throughout the warehouse.

3. 80211a; 802.11ax; 802.11b; 802.11g

4. There is no Internet Service Provider as such. The internet connection for each location is provided by Verizon as part of a contract with the General Services Administration, and access is provided by the Department of Health and Human Services through a single Trusted Internet Connection (TIC).

5. No it does not.

6. Cabling is to be installed.

7. Category 6 is required.

8. WIFI for each of the building are completely isolated, no backbone WAN.

9. No survey has been conducted.

1. Can you tell us the Government's planned Basis of Award (Best Value, LPTA, etc)?

2. Will the Government provide floor plans of the locations to be included in the installation?

3. What Internet Access Provider does the IHS utilize currently and will that Access Provider be the access point for the WiFI network delivered with this effort? 1. Best Value.

2. Forthcoming with virtual tour. Completed 7/6 & 7/7

3. There is no Internet Service Provider as such. The internet connection for each location is provided by Verizon as part of a contract with the General Services Administration, and access is provided by the Department of Health and Human Services through a single Trusted Internet Connection (TIC).

1. Can you please provide the Floor plans (Auto-CAD preferable) with approximate square footage, floors, data closet locations, pictures, and building characteristics?

2. On-site walk through- due to Covid-19, walk throughs are off and a virtual walk through is planned, but is it possible this project will be postponed until after Covid-19 so they can be accomplished?

It is very difficult to anticipate cabling, core drilling, firewall and building characteristics, without a walk through and extended Q&A period.

3. Current Network Diagram or Topology Maps?

4. Existing 802.1x solution used for AAA?

5. Indoor and Outdoor coverage required?

6. List of existing data closet switch inventory, power budget, models and serial numbers, uplinks and port speeds?

7. Number of employees and devices that will need to connect to WiFi at each location?

8. Current and Anticipated applications and bandwidth to be used on the WLAN (Voice, Video, RTLS, Data, Teams, etc.)?

9. Current AP location maps, heat maps, surveys, or other documentation that would assist in scoping the solution?

10. Will integration with Cisco DNA, Prime and ISE be required, or will the provider need to supply these solutions?

11. Is there a published standard of acceptance, such as minimum values for Signal Strength, Signal to Noise Ratio, Physical data rates, throughput per client, etc?

12. Are there specific indoor areas that will be deemed Out-of-scope, such as bathrooms, elevator shafts and stairwells, or others?

13. Are there specific outdoor areas that will be deemed Out-of-scope, such as mechanical and equipment buildings, storage areas, parking lots, or others? 1. Floor plans and location pictures send 6/26/20.

2. Due to the COVID restrictions we will not be conducting site visits. Virtual tours completed on 7/6 & 7/7.

3.There are no Network Diagrams/Topology maps available.

4. Existing 802

5. Yes, indoor and 3 locations for out door coverage is required.

a. Parking lot at Mashpee between 3 building see Tab 2

b. Parking lot at TransAm see Tab 3

c. Parking lot at Nashville building see Tab 1

6. At this time, all locations are a single VLAN. The majority are 2960X switches, however the exact setup for each one is unknown, and sites do not have an IT staff who can track that information down.

7. 8 to 15 employees/Gov't Furnished Equipment (GFE) devices.

8. Current/Anticipated application - primary data w/Electronic Health Records, however some video and MS teams are possible.

9. There are no AP's at any location.

10. A seamless intergration with Cisco.

11. There is no published standard for acceptance on wifi

12. no

13. no

1. Should the contractor provide fiber installation services to consider Industry standard best practice for redundancy?

2. Should the contractor provide new patch cables for all network connections in the MDF/IDF?

3. Is wireless considered critical infrastructure? If so, should the contractor design the Wireless Infrastructure include High Availability for each site? 1. Yes, for only 3 site, see Tab 4

2. No

3. Not at this time.

1. When are virtual tours of the sites available? We would like to get something scheduled as soon as possible.

2. Is shielded or unshielded cable required? Is there a specific brand of cabling required?

3. Is a conduit required?

4. Are new equipment racks or other items for storage/set up required? 1. The virtual tours were conducted on July 6 & 7, no other tours will be conducted as the due date is 7/24/20.

2. We want STP (Shielded Twisted Pair) and cabling is cabling no brand identified or colors required.

3. No

4. Yes it is, but only at locations that do not have space already for the new equipment.

1. Nashville:

3d Floor – 3 x 48 Port 2d Floor – 1 x 48 port 1st floor – 1 x 24 port

2. Transam: 1 x 48 port

3. Lockport: 2 x 48 ports

4. Unity 2 x 48; 1 x 24 port in the main building Unity Butler Building: 1 x 48 Port

5. Mashpee: 3 x 48 port

6. Catawba Main server room: 2 x 48 Port Catawba dental wing: 1 x 48 port

7. Manlius: 1 x 48 Port

1. Will the customer accept all variants of the Cisco Catalyst 9200 and 9300 series switches?

2. How many years of support are we including with the Cisco items? 1 year, 3 years, 5 years, etc.

3. How many years for the DNA license support? This is in regards to the Cisco hardware. 1. Yes – either the 9200 or 9300 are acceptable.

2. 5yrs

3. Possibility is there, through further discussion.

1. How thick are the exterior walls for each location that will have outside APs (Mashpee, TransAm, Nashville Office)?

2. What type of marble wall is at the Unity location? How thick? Is it hard or soft, or what is the hardness level?

3. For the Mashpee location – Is there a drop ceiling in all of the trailers? I could not tell looking at the pictures. If not, will Panduit raceway be approved to run along the wall and to the AP location if needed?

4. At Nashville Office Area: Please mark up site plan to indicate where coverage in the parking lot is required.

5. At Mashpee: Please mark up site plan to indicate where coverage in parking lot is required or can we assume full coverage?

6. At TransAm: Please mark up site paln to indicate where coverage is required for loading dock(s)

7. Per the 7/13/20 Government meeting and previous site visits, you have agreed to provided rack/shelving and switch information. For that list, can you provide the following information regarding the current IT status

1. Site Location

2. IT Room number

3. Room Purpose (i.e. HeadEnd or IDF)

4. Is Rack or shelf space available (Y or N)?

a. if HeadEnd - 4U - 5U will be needed b .if IDF only - 2U will be needed

5. Current number of connected copper ports

6. Currect number of connected fiber ports

7. Would addition fiber connections be needed to provided redundancy?

a. if so, how many?

8. Fiber Type

a. Singlemode

b. Multimode (om1, om3, etc)

9. Is contractor responsible for providing addition fiber patch cables if addition redundancy is required?

a. if so, what length and ends are required?

10. What ISO would be needed for each switch?

a. Base IP (L2 only)

b. IP Services (full L3) 1. Mashpee - 2 x 4 w/drywall inside wood or composite siding outside;

TransAm - Metal building/Metal inside and out on metal frame;

Nashville Office - Exterior of the building is full glass;

2. About 1ft thick. Very hard to drill or cut through.

3. Yes there is a drop ceiling. No will not be needed.

4. See Map Tab 1

5. See Map Tab 2

6. See Map Tab 3

7. Refer to cell B15 or Location info Tab and Tab 4

8. When is the Government's anticipated start date? Does the Government have a schedule for completion for each location? When would the Government like the project completed in entirety?

9. Given that the number of days from the revised date to submit questions and time to submit proposals equates to 2 business days, would the Government please consider extending proposal submission date 5 business days from the date that the Government answers final questions?

10. FAR 52.212-1 requires the acknowledgement of Amendments. Given the volume of email communications from the Government, and some unenumerated postings on betasam, please clarify how to respond to the requirement to acknowledge the number of amendments.

11. Please provide the preferred installation timeframe by estimated date by location, or the entire timeframe for installation. Does the Government have an anticipated date for a fully functioning system, or for each location? The Solicitation states "The installation period proposed in this contracting action will be 30 days from the date of award and until installation is completed."

12. ON June 24, 2020, the Government provided a QA document with mostly complete responses (some research still needed). On July 9, 2020, the Government provide the same QA document. Please confirm that the July 9, 2020 issuance was an intentional duplicate, just to confirm intent.

13. Please confirm that the SOW that vendors are responding to for quote purposes is the SOW issued on July 9, 2020.

14. Please confirm that the Government requires a Sustainable Acquisition Plan as part of the Offer and not on award. If in the Offer, please clarify exactly which products that the Plan applies to and where the Government's stated performance measures are for these specific products in order to meet the 95% requirement as part of new contracts--which seems to indicate that the Sustainable Action Plan is part of the Award and not the Quote. Without this information, the plan can not be completed as part of the Offer. The requirement is also to be included in a Technical Proposal, and this is a Price Only & Best Value submission without a Technical Proposal. Please advise.

15. In responses to the initial QA dated June 24, 2020, a vendor asked if a Security RMF package is required. The Government responded "If this mean Risk Management Framework? If so, it's preferable if you can." A full RMF security package for 6 networks can take 18-24 months to complete, require a substantial amount of additional information from the government,and delay the operational status of the networks. To provide the needed WLAN service as rapidly as possible would, the government consider dropping this requirement for the response and address post award? If not, should this activity be quoted as a separate line item and will the Government require, as a minimum requirement, vendors with this specific past performance? 8. 30 days after award. Refer to Location info Tab.

9. Yes, extension has been approved.

10. With consideration to agile contracting for IT, there were a total of 4 amendments to the solicitation. The first solicitation was posted with additional information provided to support the virtual tour for the for the 7 site visits, which were conducted on 7/6/ & 7/7. The second amendment was posted for an extension to the due date and the third amendment was posted with new specs for the switches. The fourth amendment was done on 7/16 to extend the due date to 7/24.

11. Project to be completed by the end of December 2020. See Loction info Tab for specific time periods

12. 6/24 email to all vendors was an informal notification of the Q&A, the same Q&A was posted to SAM on July 9.

13. SOW that vendors should be using that was posted to SAM on 7/10.

14. The Sustainable Action Plan is NOT part of the quote.

15. Please quote as a seperate line item, ISSO will do the RMF.

17. Yes

1. Given the addition of the WLAN equipment including POE enabled switches, and the high-power draw to support POE powered access points, should Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS) systems be supplied for each site as well?

2. If UPS are to be supplied as part of the proposal, how much rack space is available, what is the electrical receptacle/socket type for connection, voltage, and distance (to socket) from where the UPS would be installed?

3. What are the current switch uplinks, e.g. 1000Base-T, 1000Base-LX, 1000Base-SX, other?

4. What is the connector utilized for switch uplinks, e.g. RJ45, LC Duplex, other?

5. Are there adequate plugs on existing PDUs to accommodate the additional equipment?

6. What plug types are available on existing PDUs, e.g. C13/C14/other?

7. If PDU/space is not available, and if UPS are not to be supplied, should PDUs be added to the proposal as well and if so, is there a preference for vertical vs horizontal mounting, what is the electrical receptacle/socket type for connection, voltage, and distance (to socket) from where the PDU would be installed?

8. Is this project subject to TAA compliance requirements for equipment/technology sourcing?

9. The scope of work mentions including firewall, is this solely to separate the WLAN from the LAN or is this firewall for the site including the LAN/WLAN? If for the site overall, can details regarding the number of users, devices, bandwidth, number of ISP/WAN connections, external routing/eBGP requirements, Firewall IDS/IPS requirements and any other information that may be relevant such as VPN or SD-WAN requirements be provided on a per site basis?

10. Does the firewall need to support integration to Firepower Management Center or a different central firewall management solution?

11. What will be the authentication server for the 802.1x, e.g. ISE, Microsoft Radius/NPS, other? Is this already in place or does it need to be included in the solution proposed?

12. The scope of work states that ‘Data in transit from authorized users on a WLAN to authorized users on a wired LAN must be filtered through an appropriate filtering device (e.g., a firewall).’ – is the expectation that this will be a separate firewall/dedicated to this function (i.e. included with the solution) or is it acceptable to run this traffic through either a virtual firewall context or dedicated zones (with least privilege rules enforced) on an existing firewall that is otherwise shared for other requirements within a given site?

13. The scope of work states that least privilege must be implemented, does IHS have documentation to support this configuration, e.g. systems/applications that would be required on a group/department basis or is the contractor responsible to discover this information once onsite for the implementation? 1. UPS are available at tie, or at NAO DIRM shop. There is no need to include UPS in proposal.

2. Please See response to item 1

3. There is a mixture of cat 5e, cat 6 and fiber. There is no standard wiring configuration, however we would like to implement fiber uplinks with a standard connector at all sites.

4. As noted in Item 3, switch uplinks include RJ45, LC. There might even be an SFP.

5. These sites use stand alone APC UPS, or power strips plugged into a UPS.

6. See Item 5 above

7. See Iteme 5 above.

8. Yes it is.

9. The firewall is strictly to segment WLAN traffic from LAN traffic. The Agency manages a WAN wide IDS and firewalls at the TIC.

10. No, each site’s firewall will be a standalone appliance and will not connect to a centralized firewall system.

11. Authentication will be provided by the agency Active Directory for the IHS D1 domain.

12. Network segmentation by VLAN.

13. There is IHS documentation regarding least privilege. Will be discuss and provided post award.

14. The scope of work states that periodic wireless scanning must be performed, is the expectation that the contractor will provide post installation service/support to include periodic WLAN scanning?

15. The scope of work states that MAC authentication must be used and that 802.1x must be used for non-public access. Is it in fact required to implement 802.1x with MAC authentication or is the intent to use either 802.1x or MAC filtering depending on the ESSID?

16. Is there a single ESSID per site or multiple?

17. Is the intent/expectation to utilize a single ESSID and radius attributes to ensure proper session/access settings?

18. Is there a requirement to support BYOD at any site either upfront or in the future?

19. What are the access hours/days for installation?

20. Typical network project deliverables were not specified, such as HLD/LLD/CRD/NFRU/etc. Is this type of documentation not required but desired and to be provided as part of the Best Value offer?

21. Completing the full scope of this project within 30 days, given the complications of COVID19, may be difficult. What type of restrictions will be in place for the installation teams, i.e. is there a limit to the number of onsite personnel?

22. Will IHS make staff available to participate in Knowledge Transfer, Network Readiness Testing, etc., or is the expectation that the contractor will implement, document, and report fully/independently?

23. How will network handover/acceptance be handled? 14. Nashville IT staff will conduct wireless scanning with tools provided by the agency.

15. Network segmentation by VLAN.

16. Single

17. Yes

18. Yes. Mashpee and Catawba could change their contract status and become non-federal sites. At that time, there is a chance that a BYOD process could be implemented.

19. Normal business hours, for the exception of Unity Healing Center.

20. I’m not familiar with HLD/LLD/CRD/ etc.

21. This at the discretion of the each site. Some of the sites are ongoing medical clinics, which would significantly limit the access. However this will need to be coordinated with each site in advance.

22. At Mashpee and Transam and possibly Unity there will be a local IT person. The other sites are dependent on agency travel restrictions.

23. With the COVID environment, this may have to be determined on a case by case basis. For sure there will be a Knowledge Transfer completed, period for this will be identified at completion of installation.

Location info

LOCATION ADDRESS SWITCHES COMPLETION OF INSTALLATION

w/CONSIDERATION TO COVID ENVIRONMENT

2nd fl - 1 x 48 port

Tab 1 - Nashville Nashville Area Office - Outside connectivity is identified by the YELLOW line.

Tab 2 - Mashpee Mashpee Service Unit - Outside connectivity is identified by the YELLOW line.

Tab 3 - TransAm TransAm Warehouse - Outside connectivity is identified by the YELLOW line.

Tab 4

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