Ground Station as a Service

The Department of Commerce (DOC), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS), Office of Satellite and Product Operations (OSPO) intends to award a sole-source, firm-fixed-price contract with a magnitude ranging from $7M to $10M to ATLAS Space Operations Inc., (UEI: LUU8R95P3JM3).

The requirement is to procure scalable telemetry, tracking and command aperture services to deliver Satellite-to-Ground Communication Services. This requirement supports OSPO in accomplishing its mission of delivering environmental data from remote platforms. The scope encompasses site certification, telemetry downlink data services, and satellite commanding data services to satisfy future NESDIS requirements for commercial remote telemetry downlink for partner missions.  Key supported missions include, but are not limited to:  

• COSMIC-2, (the Constellation Observing System for Meteorology Ionosphere and Climate-2)/FORMOSAT-7 
• KOMPSAT-5, Korea Multi-Purpose Satellite-5 (KOMPSAT-5), and 
• PAZ, Spanish Earth Observation Satellite  

The proposed contract action will be conducted using other than full and open competition procedures pursuant to the authority at 41 U.S.C. 3304(a)(1), as implemented by the Revolutionary Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Overhaul (RFO) Subpart 6.103-1,Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services will satisfy agency requirements.

Justification for Non-Competitive Action: ATLAS is the only vendor that possesses the established, fully compliant ground station network and operational authorizations required to fulfill NOAA's mission objectives without catastrophic schedule disruption and unrecoverable cost growth. ATLAS currently holds all active, validated, and fully compliant international spectrum licenses and host-nation operating authorizations across the required equatorial downlink footprint. These authorizations are non-transferable. ATLAS represents the only evaluated source possessing the fully qualified, operational front-end processor architectures, automated scheduling APIs, and verified performance thresholds required to meet NESDIS data delivery requirements without introducing unacceptable integration costs, programmatic delays, and mission-critical data loss risks.

Notice to Interested Sources: This Notice of Intent (NOI) is not a request for competitive proposals or quotations. However, in accordance with RFO 5.101, all responsible sources may submit a capability statement, which shall be considered by the agency.  Information received will be evaluated solely for the purpose of determining whether to conduct a competitive procurement. A determination by the Government not to compete this proposed requirement based upon responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. 

Response Instructions: Capability statements or responses must be submitted electronically via email  to the Contracting Officer to Ms. Trang Tran, at Trang.Tran@noaa.gov with a courtesy copy to Ms. Markita Simmonds, Contracting Specialist, at Markita.Simmonds@noaa.gov.  Submissions must clearly demonstrate the technical capability, active international spectrum licenses, and host-nation authorizations required to meet the Government’s technical objectives.  Concerned parties should address any questions, issues, disagreements, or recommendations to the Contracting Officer.