Special Notice of Intent to Sole Source Award

NOTICE OF INTENT TO AWARD A SOLE SOURCE
This Notice of Intent is not a request for competitive proposals. This is not a solicitation or request for offers. No solicitation package is available and telephone requests will not be honored. Only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.

The Mississippi River FWCO intends to award a sole source purchase order to Innovasea to furnish: Innovasea Acoustic Telemetry Receivers

The North American Industry Classification System Code (NAICS) for this requirement is 334290 with the size standard of 800 employees. The Federal Supply Code (FSC) / Product Service Code (PSC) procurement is 5820.

Name of Item: Innovasea acoustic receivers with batteries
Model Number: Innovasea VR2W Receiver
Quantity: 11
Salient Characteristics:
69kHz
Batteries
Bluetooth
1 magnetic activation probe
Capabilities: These receivers will be used with an ongoing acoustic tracking project that is using Vemco transmitters. Project standards and analyses can only be warranted if VR2W acoustic receivers are purchased.

This purchase will be made utilizing Simplified Acquisition Procedures in accordance with:
Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Part 13.106-1(b) for purchases not exceeding the simplified acquisition threshold of $250,000.
Interested parties may identify their interests and capability to respond to this requirement within three (3) calendar days of the publication of this notice. Any response to this notice must show clear and convincing evidence that competition would be advantageous to the Government. Information received will be considered solely for the purpose of determining whether or not to conduct a competitive procurement. A determination by the Government not to compete this proposed purchase order based upon response to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. No reimbursement for any cost connected with providing capability information will be provided.

The point of contact is: Jack Skogen, email: jack_skogen@fws.gov
Please reference this Notice of Intent number on your correspondence and in the Subject line of your email.

This notice will close on: 8/23/2023 at 5:00pm, Central Time.


Sole Source Justification
Dear Customer,
This is to confirm that the following statements are true.
1. Innovasea is the sole developer, manufacturer, and supplier of the Vemco line of acoustic telemetry receivers, transmitters, receiver upgrades and receiver accessories and all associated software.
2. Vemco coded transmitters and monitoring receivers use Innovasea owned proprietary technology and coding techniques. These are not based on an open standard. This technology provides vast numbers of unique tag IDs to allow for interoperability and compatibility of over 20,000 Vemco receivers deployed worldwide.
3. Vemco tag IDs and deployments are managed through the Vemco tag ID database which is solely owned and accessible by Innovasea. The Innovasea tag ID database is critical to the successful operation of Vemco acoustic telemetry studies.
4. Vemco monitoring receivers and coded transmitters are only warranted to operate with Vemco products. All Vemco support services including study advice, data analysis, VR2W Positioning System (VPS) data analysis, false detection analysis, determining foreign ID tag ownership etc., can only be provided to users with datasets generated using the complete Vemco acoustic telemetry system as we are unable to validate nor analyze detection files from other manufacturers¿ receivers or transmitters.
5. Claims of compatibility by manufacturers with ¿knock-off tags¿ are false. Use of knock-off transmitters may interfere with other Vemco based studies and thus threatens the integrity of thousands of on-going research studies globally.
6. Innovasea only operates sales offices in Nova Scotia Canada, Tasmania Australia, Cologne Germany and Washington State USA.
7. Innovasea is the sole proprietor for repairs. All repairs are performed at our Nova Scotia production facility.

Sincerely,
Amy Brookman
Vice President - Sales