SOURCES SOUGHT
L -- Autonomie Rev1 - Package #1
- Notice Date
- 3/25/2011
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- NAICS
- 336111
— Automobile Manufacturing
- Contracting Office
- Department of Energy, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE Contractor), Argonne, 9700 S. Cass Avenue, Argonne, Illinois, 60439
- ZIP Code
- 60439
- Solicitation Number
- argonne
- Archive Date
- 4/9/2011
- Point of Contact
- Paul Betten, Phone: 6302524962
- E-Mail Address
-
betten@anl.gov
(betten@anl.gov)
- Small Business Set-Aside
- N/A
- Description
- Commerciialization and licensing plan Subject: Request for Proposals for Licensing, Distribution, Technical Support and Training for Autonomie Software Over the past several years, the Center for Transportation Research staff at Argonne National Laboratory has developed a Modeling and Simulation tool, named Autonomie. Autonomie allows the simulation of subsystems, systems and entire vehicles throughout the different stages of the virtual engineering process (more information at www.autonomie.net ). This product has been commercially available via license agreements since October, 2010. While Argonne will continue to conduct the research to develop and enhance the software, we would like to spinoff the software licensing, training and technical support activities to a commercial organization. Multiple companies have indicated a strong interest in being able to provide these services and to become a distributor for the Autonomie software. Argonne is requesting proposals from organizations interested in serving as a distributor, training, technical support and service provider for Autonomie. A commercialization and licensing package for Autonomie is provided to enable development of your proposal. Autonomie is a plug-and-play powertrain and vehicle model architecture and development environment that supports the rapid evaluation of new powertrain/propulsion technologies (such as the rapidly expanding fields of electric drive vehicles) for fuel economy improvement, under dynamic/transient testing conditions, via virtual design and analysis in a math-based simulation environment. Traditional design paradigms in the automotive industry rely on building and testing hardware, which is expensive and time consuming, often requiring several costly hardware iterations. Thus, greater emphasis is being placed by vehicle manufacturers on virtual building and testing through modeling and simulation methods to minimize builds, reduce costs and improve time-to-market. Autonomie was designed to facilitate all of the processes required to develop automotive systems through the efficient and cost effective methods of modeling and simulation. Argonne has currently over 150 licensees (companies, universities, research centers) and over 800 users of Autonomie in both the light duty and heavy duty automotive markets. Since Autonomie was designed to be a generic tool for simulation and system analysis, several new application areas, including aerospace, are also being evaluated. Due to increased usage, interest in additional license, training and help-desk inquiries has been rapidly increasing. The commercialization and licensing package contains two items. The first item, Attachment #1, is a commercialization package. Argonne requires a commercialization plan from prospective licensees before licensing Autonomie. Please answer all the questions on the form. The information you provide will determine the basis for the license terms that Argonne will consider for the licensing agreement. This information is business proprietary and will be held confidential by Argonne. Argonne will only consider existing well established companies. The second item is the Autonomie Licensing Plan. In licensing the Autonomie software tool for licensing, training and technical support, Argonne will consider the following criteria in selecting a Licensee: 1) Marketing plan for the sublicensing and distribution of the Autonomie software. 2) Licensing fees, including upfront fees, royalties and revenue allocations. Pricing (i.e., purchase and maintenance) should be provided for different types of organizations (i.e., commercial, research, universities, consulting) and locations (U.S, foreign). Licensees should also mention if/by how much they intend to increase the price over time. Any entity directly supporting the U.S. government activities will continue to receive licenses at no cost. For current pricing, visit http://www.autonomie.net/services.html. 3) Existing or developing relationships with automobile and truck manufacturers. 4) In case the company already sells software, the application should demonstrate that Autonomie will not compete with other tools within the company and will not develop a tool that would later compete with Autonomie. In addition, any documentation providing customer feedback for training and support on existing product will be appreciated. In addition, complementary software is a plus. 5) Experience with software licenses with major companies ( provide names of companies you have such agreements with are a plus). 6) Ability to provide and maintain a help desk 24/7, including installation questions and USB security key maintenance. The availability of customer service surveys would be a benefit. 7) Ability to provide training world-wide, including travel or establishment of a local regional office. Previous training experience is required. 8) Alliances with other organizations to provide support and training 9) Diligences, including minimum sales and training sessions and plans for continuous improvement in sales and training materials. 10) For licensing, training and technical support, exclusivity is envisioned for a geographical field-of-use, and may be within the U.S. as well as areas outside the U.S. such as the European Union and Asia. International experience is desired. 11) Ability to contract with Argonne on a work-for-others agreement so that Argonne can provide specific training and technical support when required. 12) Timeframe requested for the duration of license agreement. After licensing, R&D improvements in Autonomie will continue to be performed by Argonne and provided to the distributor(s). Argonne will only provide the executable code to the Distributor for distribution. Autonomie is to be distributed as a separate tool, not integrated into existing tools or modified unless previously agreed to by Argonne. Distributors are required to keep the Autonomie pricing constant for at least six months after an agreement is reached. Training pricing is expected to meet current commercial standards for similar products. Argonne will hold a morning summary with a question and answer session on this RFP on March 29, 2011 at Argonne. Please call the Argonne Technology Commercialization and Development (TDC) Division, Ms. Karen Neuman, at 630-252-9124 or 800-627-2596 to register for this session. The final proposals, addressing the above criteria, as well as the commercialization plan, must be submitted to the TDC on or before April 22, 2011. The company will be selected and announced on May 23, 2011. The licensing agreements, and work-for- others agreements are expected by July 8, 2011. Please contact me if you have any questions or wish to sign up for the Autonomie RFP conference on March 29, 2011. I look forward to receiving your Autonomie Commercialization and Licensing plan.
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