Loren Data's SAM Daily™

FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF APRIL 22, 2017 FBO #5629
SOLICITATION NOTICE

A -- Foundations of Trusted Computational Information Systems

Notice Date

4/20/2017
 

Notice Type

Presolicitation
 

NAICS

541712 — Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences (except Biotechnology)
 

Contracting Office

Department of the Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL/RIK - Rome, 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, New York, 13441-4514, United States
 

ZIP Code

13441-4514
 

Solicitation Number

FA8750-17-S-7007
 

Point of Contact

Gail E. Marsh, Phone: 315-330-7518
 

E-Mail Address

Gail.Marsh@us.af.mil
(Gail.Marsh@us.af.mil)
 

Small Business Set-Aside

N/A
 

Description

NAICS CODE: 541712 FEDERAL AGENCY NAME: Department of the Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL - Rome Research Site, AFRL/Information Directorate, 26 Electronic Parkway, Rome, NY, 13441-4514 BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT (BAA) TITLE: Foundations of Trusted Computational Information Systems BAA ANNOUNCEMENT TYPE: Initial announcement BAA NUMBER: BAA FA8750-17-S-7007 PART I - OVERVIEW INFORMATION This announcement is for an Open, 2 Step BAA which is open and effective until 30 Sep 2021. Only white papers are due at this time. While white papers will be considered if received prior to 1400 on 30 Sep 2021, the following submission dates are suggested to best align with projected funding: FY17 by 31 May 2017 FY18 by 07 Dec 2017 FY19 by 06 Dec 2018 FY20 by 04 Dec 2019 FY21 by 03 Dec 2020 Offerors should monitor the Federal Business Opportunities website at http://www.fbo.gov in the event this announcement is amended. CONCISE SUMMARY OF FUNDING OPPORTUNITY: The Air Force Research Laboratory, Information Directorate is seeking innovative technologies/techniques that establish trusted foundations for hardware and software that enable secure, resilient, affordable Command, Control, Communications, Computer, Intelligence and Cyber (C4+1I) information processing systems. BAA ESTIMATED FUNDING: Total funding for this BAA is approximately $24.9M. Individual awards will not normally exceed 36 months with dollar amounts normally ranging from $100K to $3M. There is also the potential to make awards up to any dollar value as long as that amount does not exceed the BAA ceiling. ANTICIPATED INDIVIDUAL AWARDS: Multiple Awards are anticipated TYPE OF INSTRUMENTS THAT MAY BE AWARDED: Procurement contract, grant, cooperative agreement or other transactions AGENCY CONTACT INFORMATION: All white paper and proposal submissions and any questions of a technical nature shall be directed to the cognizant Technical Point of Contact (TPOC) as specified below (unless otherwise specified in the technical area): All white paper and proposal submissions and any questions of a technical nature shall be directed to the cognizant TPOC as specified below (unless otherwise specified in the technical area): BAA MANAGER: Christopher Flynn AFRL/RITA 525 Brooks Rd Rome, NY 13441-4505 Telephone: (315)330-3249 Email: Christopher.Flynn.6@us.af.mil Questions of a contractual/business nature shall be directed to the cognizant contracting officer, as specified below (email requests are preferred): Gail Marsh Telephone (315) 330-7518 Email: Gail.Marsh@us.af.mil Emails must reference the solicitation (BAA) number and title of the acquisition. Communication between Prospective Offerors and Government Representatives: Dialogue between prospective offerors and Government representatives is encouraged. Technical and contracting questions can be resolved in writing or through open discussions. Discussions with any of the points of contact shall not constitute a commitment by the Government to subsequently fund or award any proposed effort. Only Contracting Officers are legally authorized to commit the Government. Proposers are cautioned that evaluation ratings may be lowered and/or proposal rejected if proposal preparation (Proposal format, content, etc.) and/or submittal instructions are not followed. PART II - FULL TEXT ANNOUNCEMENT BROAD AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENT (BAA) TITLE: Foundations of Trusted Computational Information Systems BAA NUMBER: FA8750-17-S-7007 CATALOG OF FEDERAL DOMESTIC ASSISTANCE (CFDA) Number: 12.800 and 12.910 I. FUNDING OPPORTUNITY DESCRIPTION: The Air Force and Department of Defense (DoD) are dependent upon information technologies for almost everything they do, yet more needs to be done to secure the processing foundations upon which information technology infrastructure depends. Additionally, the sheer volume of data types being continuously being collected is now so voluminous that only a small subset of the data collected can effectively be refined into information, knowledge and actionable intelligence for decision makers. The Air Force Research Laboratory is soliciting white papers under this Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) for research, development, integration, test and evaluation of innovative technologies/techniques that establish trusted foundations for hardware and software that enable secure, resilient, affordable Command, Control, Communications, Computer, Intelligence and Cyber (C4+1I) information processing systems. Additional innovative technologies are sought to simultaneously increase the computational sophistication and decision aid capacities of these same systems. Of particular interest are technologies that support hardware and software foundations for high assurance, trusted/secure architectures, increased computational sophistication of general purpose and specialized processing, increased complex system functionality with improved resilience, embedded processing and quantum information processing. Also of interest are technologies that can reduce warfighter decision latencies/response time, decrease system costs and system development times, automate labor-intensive/error-prone and costly aspects of system software development, and improve reliability, longevity, upgradability, and usability of emerging and legacy military information systems. Operation in a contested cyberspace domain requires that our systems must be resilient to unforeseen cyber-attacks. System characteristics dependent on geo-distribution, autonomy, and cooperation rely on trust within the system. Many mission critical systems and components currently lack the ability to adapt and be resilient to unforeseen failure and cyber-attacks. Methodologies and techniques to understand, maintain or reestablish trust in the system and its components to ensure mission success during execution and fight-through are non-existent. Resilient systems must possess self-healing capabilities that can dynamically effect change in the system to fight through unforeseen cyber-attacks (while maintaining mission essential functions (MEF)) as well as provide proof of continued or re-established trust in the system, as the dynamic change will have eroded mission/system trust based on the time-consuming, human-intensive and expensive Verification and Validation (V&V) established offline prior to mission deployment. To overcome these challenges, computing architectures require advances in resiliency technologies that enable fight through of unforeseen faults and cyber-attacks, while simultaneously assessing and/or reestablishing trust in near real-time to ensure mission success. This effort will investigate the research, development, and/or application of trusted/secure information processing architecture technologies, products and standards as they relate to the following technical areas: (1) Development of appropriate information technology to enhance the processing capabilities of current and future Air Force C4I systems : This technical area encompasses all information processing technology, both hardware and software, that could potentially contribute to enhancing the security, trustworthiness, functionality, performance, reliability, longevity, scalability, resiliency, upgradability, and usability of legacy or planned Air Force C4I processing systems. Examples of conventional hardware technologies include domain-specific/specialized processing engines (both digital and analog), heterogeneous and many-core processing architectures with emphasis on hardware support for graph analytics processing, semantic operations, energy-efficient and energy-aware processing architectures, high assurance/trusted/secure processing architectures, sophisticated memory controllers and performance optimization tools. (2) Trusted and Resilient Software-intensive Systems Engineering : The objective of the trusted and resilient software-intensive systems engineering technical area is to develop techniques, methodologies and tools to guarantee trust (as measured by correctness, security, reliability, predictability, and survivability) and maintain this trust as self-healing/resilient techniques fight through cyber-attacks to include zero-day attacks. This research area is seeking to extend and advance software development tools that will enable the development and/or execution of trusted and resilient software systems for enterprise and tactical level embedded cyber physical platforms. This area will focus on research and development to advance SW development tools, to include formal tools, model based techniques and/or architectures based approaches to enable the development of software (SW) systems that are both trusted and resilient. Research and development will also be focused on new approaches, methods and/or tools for continuous (runtime) V&V and runtime environments that can monitor and maintain a trusted and resilient envelope of operation. Technical areas of interest include: techniques to enable trust in model-based software engineering; model-based engineering for predictable software attributes; Formal methods tools; provably correct code generation; provably correct code repair, evidence-based software assurance; evolutionary approaches, trusted software and systems composability; modeling, analysis, and verification of autonomous software; novel architectural approaches, strategic "roots of trust," hardening and resiliency techniques such as artificial diversity, containment areas for execution of untrusted software, lightweight runtime monitoring techniques and utilization of hardware (HW) advances, trusted and resilient mechanisms to fight through software failures, cyber-attacks to include zero-day attack; human understanding and trust of automated software development, red teaming, metrics and measures of trustworthy systems, integration, validation and demonstration on a realistic mission critical embedded system exemplar, autonomous resilience, self-healing software systems, and pliable computing. (3) Quantum Information Processing : This technical area includes quantum information processing and computation with an emphasis on photon-based qubits including quantum integrated optical waveguide circuitry, interactions between photon-based qubits and trapped ion qubits, quantum repeaters, high dimensional entanglement, quantum compressed sensing, measurement based quantum computation, with an emphasis on the utilization of photon-based qubits, single-photon/entangled-photons on demand, single-photon/entangled-photons on demand, quantum algorithms employing cluster/graph states, ion trapped qubits, quantum annealing or adiabatic quantum computation, blind quantum computation. This technical area also includes quantum information processing and quantum networking based on trapped ion qubits including ion-photon interfaces for long-distance communication, remote entangling schemes, trapped-ion based quantum node development, quantum repeaters, and photon-based interconnects. (4) Trusted, secure, and resilient computational systems : The objective of this technical area is to research and develop the essential elements, tools and methodologies for trusted, secure and resilient computing environments, including both the underlying hardware and software, side by side with power, cost, performance, and reliability. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: (a) Problems and challenges with current processor designs for trustworthiness and their solutions; (b) Problems and challenges with current computer architectures for trustworthiness and solutions to them; (c) Tools and methodologies for ensuring trustworthiness of integrated circuits (ICs) and systems targeting malicious inclusions, side-channel attacks, probing attacks, etc.; (d) New computer architectures for secure and reliable computing, including data integrity and code protection and verification; (e) Operating System level constructs, objects, functions and distributions that must be provided to complement the hardware to enable a trustworthy computing base; (f) State-of-the-art software-based assurance designs, methodologies or concepts which are better suited for implementation in hardware than software. This technical area is also interested in research and development for increasing the level of trustworthiness of IC designs, commodity ICs and currently available systems as a whole. Finally, this technical area is also interested in security enhancements possible in the software tool chain used for compiling and linking source code, runtime security as well as research in the implications of state-of-the-art commercially available processor architectures and specially designed processor architectures that will enable delivery of trustworthy, secure and timely information. (5) Cyber Physical Systems (CPS): The objective of this technical area is to develop the tools, methodologies, and foundational science to provide the scalability and interoperability necessary to make the integration and subsequent analysis of computational and physical components and the networks connecting them practicable. Technical areas of interest include: (a) Specification, modeling, and analysis such as heterogeneous models of computation and hybrid discrete and continuous systems; (b) Modularity, composability, predictability, and synthesis addressing the issues of scalability and the integration of legacy systems; and (c) Verification and validation techniques (assurance, simulation, formal methods, correct-and-secure-by-construction, etc.) applicable to these models. (6) Software Assurance : Achieving the degree of Software Assurance across the application space requires a holistic approach that agilely addresses all layers of the supply chain and enterprise including governance, partnerships, process, standards, and education. The objective of this area is to enhance and create the foundations of Software Assurance (SwA). Areas of interest include: Tools Assessment and Categorization; Prototype Software Assurance Demonstration; and SwA technology which advances the state of SwA by addressing technology gaps to improve SwA tools (e.g. precision and recall) and scalability (e.g. code size, expertise required, and execution time). II. AWARD INFORMATION: 1. FUNDING: Total funding for this BAA is approximately $24.9M. The anticipated funding to be obligated under this BAA is broken out by fiscal year as follows: FY17 - $1.9M FY18 - $5.8M FY19 - $5.8M FY20 - $5.8M FY21 - $5.6M Individual awards will not normally exceed 36 months with dollar amounts normally ranging from $100K to $3M. There is also the potential to make awards up to any dollar value as long as that amount does not exceed that BAA ceiling. The Government reserves the right to select all, part, or none of the proposals received, subject to the availability of funds. All potential Offerors should be aware that due to unanticipated budget fluctuations, funding in any or all areas may change with little or no notice. 2. FORM. Awards of efforts as a result of this announcement will be in the form of contracts, grants, cooperative agreements or other transactions depending upon the nature of the work proposed. 3. BAA TYPE: This is a two-step open broad agency announcement. This announcement constitutes the only solicitation. As STEP ONE - The Government is only soliciting white papers at this time. DO NOT SUBMIT A FORMAL PROPOSAL. Those white papers found to be consistent with the intent of this BAA may be invited to submit a technical and cost proposal, see Section VI of this announcement for further details regarding the proposal. III. ELIGIBILITY INFORMATION: 1. ELIGIBILITY: All qualified offerors who meet the requirements of this BAA may apply. 2. FOREIGN PARTICIPATION/ACCESS: a. This BAA is closed to foreign participation at the Prime Contractor level. b. Foreign Ownership, Control or Influence (FOCI) companies who have mitigated FOCI may inquire as to eligibility by contacting the contracting office focal point, Gail E. Marsh, Contracting Officer, telephone (315) 330-7518 or e-mail Gail.Marsh@us.af.mil for verification prior to submitting a white paper. Please reference BAA FA8750-17-S-7007. c. Contractor employees requiring access to USAF bases, AFRL facilities, and/or access to U.S. Government Information Technology (IT) networks in connection with the work on contracts, assistance instruments or other transactions awarded under this BAA must be U.S. citizens. For the purpose of base and network access, possession of a permanent resident card ("Green Card") does not equate to U.S. citizenship. This requirement does not apply to foreign nationals approved by the U.S. Department of Defense or U.S. State Department under international personnel exchange agreements with foreign governments. Any waivers to this requirement must be granted in writing by the Contracting Officer prior to providing access. The above requirements are in addition to any other contract requirements related to obtaining a Common Access Card (CAC). If an IT network/system does not require AFRL to endorse a contractor's application to said network/system in order to gain access, the organization operating the IT network/system is responsible for controlling access to its system. If an IT network/system requires a U.S. Government sponsor to endorse the application in order for access to the IT network/system, AFRL will only endorse the following types of applications, consistent with the requirements above: 1. Contractor employees who are U.S. citizens performing work under contracts, assistance instruments or other transactions awarded under this BAA. 2. Contractor employees who are non-U.S. citizens and who have been granted a waiver. Any additional access restrictions established by the IT network/system owner apply. 3. FEDERALLY FUNDED RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CENTERS AND GOVERNMENT ENTITIES: Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDCs) and Government entities (e.g., Government/National laboratories, military educational institutions, etc.) are subject to applicable direct competition limitations and cannot propose to this BAA in any capacity unless they meet the following conditions: a. FFRDCs : FFRDCs must clearly demonstrate that the proposed work is not otherwise available from the private sector; and FFRDCs must provide a letter on official letterhead from their sponsoring organization citing the specific authority establishing their eligibility to propose to Government solicitations and compete with industry, and their compliance with the associated FFRDC sponsor agreement's terms and conditions. This information is required for FFRDCs proposing to be prime contractors or sub-awardees. b. Government Entities : Government entities must clearly demonstrate that the work is not otherwise available from the private sector and provide written documentation citing the specific statutory authority and contractual authority, if relevant, establishing their ability to propose to Government solicitations. While 10 U.S.C.§ 2539b may be the appropriate statutory starting point for some entities, specific supporting regulatory guidance, together with evidence of agency approval, will still be required to fully establish eligibility. FFRDC and Government entity eligibility will be determined on a case-by-case basis; however, the burden to prove eligibility for all team members rests solely with the proposer. IV. APPLICATION AND SUBMISSION INFORMATION: All responses to this announcement must be addressed to the Technical Point of Contact (TPOC) listed in SECTION VII. DO NOT send white papers to the Contracting Officer. 1. SUBMISSION DATES AND TIMES: It is recommended that white papers be received by 2 PM Eastern Standard Time (EST) on the following dates to maximize the possibility of award: FY17 by 31 May 2017 FY18 by 07 Dec 2017 FY19 by 06 Dec 2018 FY20 by 04 Dec 2019 FY21 by 03 Dec 2020 White papers will be accepted until 2 PM EST on 30 Sep 2021, but it is less likely that funding will be available in each respective fiscal year after the dates cited. This BAA will close on 30 Sep 2021. All offerors submitting white papers will be contacted by the TPOC, referenced in Section VII of this announcement. Offerors can email the TPOC for status of their white paper/proposal no earlier than 45 days after submission. 2. CONTENT AND FORMAT: Offerors are required to submit 1 copy of a 2 to 5 page white paper summarizing their proposed approach/solution. The purpose of the white paper is to preclude unwarranted effort on the part of an offeror whose proposed work is not of interest to the Government. The white paper will be formatted as follows: a. Section A : Title, Period of Performance, Estimated Cost, Name/Address of Company, Technical and Contracting Points of Contact (phone, fax and email)(this section is NOT included in the page count); b. Section B : Task Objective; and c. Section C : Technical Summary and Proposed Deliverables. All white papers shall be double spaced with a font no smaller than 12 point. In addition, respondents are requested to provide their Commercial and Government Entity (CAGE) Code, their unique entity identifier and the Electronic Funds Transfer Indicator (if applicable), a fax number, an e-mail address, and reference BAA FA8750-17-S-7007 with their submission. Multiple white papers within the purview of this announcement may be submitted by each offeror. If the offeror wishes to restrict its white papers, they must be marked with the restrictive language stated in FAR 15.609(a) and (b). 3. HANDLING AND MAILING INSTRUCTIONS: a. CLASSIFICATION GUIDANCE. All Proposers should review the NATIONAL INDUSTRIAL SECURITY PROGRAM OPERATING MANUAL, (NISPOM), dated February 28, 2006 and incorporating Change 2, dated May 18, 2016, as it provides baseline standards for the protection of classified information and prescribes the requirements concerning Contractor Developed Information under paragraph 4-105. Defense Security Service (DSS) Site for the NISPOM is: http://www.dss.mil/. In the event of a possible or actual compromise of classified information in the submission of your white paper or proposal, immediately but no later than 24 hours, bring this to the attention of your cognizant security authority and AFRL Rome Research Site Information Protection Office (IPO): Vincent Guza (contact only is there if a security issue) 315-330-4048 0730-1630 Monday-Friday 315-330-2961 Evenings and Weekends Email: vincent.guza@us.af.mil b. CLASSIFIED SUBMISSIONS. AFRL/RITA will accept classified responses to this BAA when the classification is mandated by classification guidance provided by an Original Classification Authority of the U.S. Government, or when the offeror believes the work, if successful, would merit classification. Security classification guidance in the form of a DD Form 254 (DoD Contract Security Classification Specification) will not be provided at this time since AFRL is soliciting ideas only. Offerors that intend to include classified information or data in their white paper submission or who are unsure about the appropriate classification of their white papers should contact the technical point of contact listed in Section VII for guidance and direction in advance of preparation. c. MAILING INSTRUCTIONS. Any mailed responses, unclassified/classified, to this announcement must be sent U.S. Postal Service, registered mail or similar service and addressed to AFRL/RITA, 525 Brooks Road, Rome NY 13441-4505, and reference BAA FA8750-17-S-7007. When mailing follow the directions regarding the number of copies required. Unclassified electronic submission to Christopher.Flynn.6@us.af.mil will also be accepted. Encrypt or password-protect all proprietary information prior to sending. Offerors are responsible to confirm receipt with the TPOC listed in Section VII. AFRL is not responsible for undelivered documents. If electronic submission is used, only one copy of the documentation is required. Questions can be directed to the TPOC listed in Section VII. 4. OTHER SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS/CONSIDERATIONS: a. COST SHARING OR MATCHING: Cost sharing is not a requirement. Cost sharing may be proposed and will be considered on a case-by-case basis. b. SYSTEM FOR AWARD MANAGEMENT (SAM). Offerors must be registered in the SAM database to receive a contract award, and remain registered during performance and through final payment of any contract or agreement. Processing time for registration in SAM, which normally takes forty-eight hours, should be taken into consideration when registering. Offerors who are not already registered should consider applying for registration before submitting a proposal. The provision at FAR 52.204-7, System for Award Management (Oct 2016) applies. c. EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION AND FIRST-TIER SUBCONTRACT/ SUBRECIPIENT AWARDS: Any contract award resulting from this announcement may contain the clause at FAR 52.204-10 - Reporting Executive Compensation and First-Tier Subcontract Awards (Oct 2016). Any grant or agreement award resulting from this announcement may contain the award term set forth in 2 CFR, Appendix A to Part 25 which can be viewed at: Http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=8fb6c83606df57968c3e7e145e7d683c&mc=true&node=ap2.1.25_1360.a&rgn= div9 d. ALLOWABLE CHARGES: The cost of preparing white papers/proposals in response to this announcement is not considered an allowable direct charge to any resulting contract or any other contract, but may be an allowable expense to the normal bid and proposal indirect cost specified in FAR 31.205-18. Incurring pre-award costs for ASSISTANCE INSTRUMENTS ONLY are regulated by the DoD Grant and Agreements Regulations (DODGARS). e. GOVERNMENT APPROVED ACCOUNTING SYSTEM: An offeror must have a government approved accounting system prior to award of a cost-reimbursement contract per limitations set forth in FAR 16.301-3(a) to ensure the system is adequate for determining costs applicable to the contract. The acceptability of an accounting system is determined based upon an audit performed by the Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA). IMPORTANT: If you do not have a DCAA approved accounting system access the following link for instructions: https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=1cffad228f48b58057072a6c9113799d&tab= core&_cview=1 V. APPLICATION REVIEW INFORMATION: 1. CRITERIA: The following criteria, which are listed in descending order of importance and will be used to determine whether white papers and proposals submitted are consistent with the research areas of interest and expected results within the broad topic areas as described in the Funding Opportunity section of this BAA and of interest to the Government: a. Overall Scientific and Technical Merit - The extent to which the proposed technical approach to the development and/or enhancement of the proposed technology demonstrates scientific and technical merit, clearly defined and developed technical concepts and sufficient detail to support the proposed concepts and technical claims. b. Capabilities and Related Experience - The extent to which the offeror demonstrates relevant technology and domain knowledge to establish that the offeror has credible capability and experience to complete the proposed work. c. Openness, Maturity and Assurance of Solution - The extent to which existing capabilities and standards are leveraged and the relative maturity of the proposed technology in terms of reliability and robustness. d. Reasonableness and realism of proposed costs and fees (if any) No further evaluation criteria will be used in selecting white papers/proposals. White papers and proposals submitted will be evaluated as they are received. 2. REVIEW AND SELECTION PROCESS: a. Only Government employees will evaluate the white papers/proposals for selection. The Air Force Research Laboratory's Information Directorate has contracted for various business and staff support services, some of which require contractors to obtain administrative access to proprietary information submitted by other contractors. Administrative access is defined as "handling or having physical control over information for the sole purpose of accomplishing the administrative functions specified in the administrative support contract, which do not require the review, reading, and comprehension of the content of the information on the part of non-technical professionals assigned to accomplish the specified administrative tasks." These contractors have signed general non-disclosure agreements and organizational conflict of interest statements. The required administrative access will be granted to non-technical professionals. Examples of the administrative tasks performed include: a. Assembling and organizing information for R&D case files; b. Accessing library files for use by government personnel; and c. Handling and administration of proposals, contracts, contract funding and queries. Any objection to administrative access must be in writing to the Contracting Officer and shall include a detailed statement of the basis for the objection. b. WHITE PAPER/PROPOSAL REVIEW PROCESS : 1. FIRST STEP - White Paper Reviews : The Government will review White Papers to determine which of them have the potential to best meet the Air Force's needs based on the criteria listed above. If white papers are of interest and funding is available, AFRL/RI will request a formal technical and cost proposal from offeror. If white papers are not of interest or there is not funding available, a letter is sent to the offeror indicating the reason not selected. 2. SECOND STEP - Proposal Review and Selection Process a) Categories: Based on the evaluation, proposals will be categorized as Highly Recommended, Selectable, or Not Selectable (see definitions below). The selection ofone or more offerors for award will be based on the evaluation, as well as importance to agency programs and funding availability. 1) Highly Recommended : Proposals are recommended for acceptance if sufficient funding is available, and normally are displaced only by other Highly Recommended proposals. 2) Selectable : Proposals are recommended for acceptance if sufficient funding is available, but at a lower priority than Highly Recommended Proposals. May require additional development. To ensure a diversity of approaches, a Selectable proposal may be prioritized over a Highly Recommended proposal if the Selectable proposal presents a unique approach unlike any of the Highly Recommended proposals. 3) Not Selectable : Even if sufficient funding existed, the proposal should not be funded. c. The Government reserves the right to award some, all, or none of the proposals. When the Government elects to award only a part of a proposal, the selected part may be categorized as Highly Recommended or Selectable, though the proposal as a whole may not merit such a categorization. d. No other evaluation criteria will be used. e. Proposal Risk Assessment: Proposal risk for technical, cost, and schedule will be assessed for formal proposals, should they be requested, as part of the evaluation of the above evaluation criteria. Proposal risk relates to the identification and assessment of the risks associated with an offeror's proposed approach as it relates to accomplishing the proposed effort. Tradeoffs of the assessed risk will be weighed against the potential scientific benefit. Proposal risk for schedule relates to an assessment of the risks associated with the offeror's proposed number of hours, labor categories, materials, or other cost elements as it relates to meeting the proposed period of performance. f. Prior to award of a potentially successful offer, the Contracting Officer will make a determination regarding price reasonableness and realism. 3. FEDERAL AWARDEE PERFORMANCE AND INTEGRITY INFORMATION SYSTEM (FAPIIS) PUBLIC ACCESS: As required by 2 CFR 200 of the Uniform Guidance and FAR 9.104-6, the Government is required to review and consider any information about the applicant that is in the FAPIIS before making any award in excess of the simplified acquisition threshold (currently $150,000) over the period of performance. An applicant may review and comment on any information about itself that a federal awarding agency previously entered. The Government will consider any comments by the applicant, in addition to other information in FAPIIS in making a judgment about the applicant's integrity, business ethics, and record of performance under federal awards when completing the review of risk posed by applicants as described in 2 CFR § 200.205 Federal Awarding Agency Review of Risk Posed by Applicants and FAR 9.104-6. VI. STEP TWO INFORMATION - REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL & AWARD: 1. PROPOSAL FORMATING: When developing proposals, reference the AFRL "Broad Agency Announcement (BAA): Guide for Industry," Mar 2015, and RI-Specific Proposal Preparation Instructions, Jan 2017, which may be accessed at: https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=1cffad228f48b58057072a6c9113799d&tab= core&_cview=1. Always reference the newest versions of these documents. 2. AWARD NOTICES: Those white papers found to be consistent with the research areas of interest and expected results within the broad topic areas as described in the Funding Opportunity section of this BAA and of interest to the Government may be invited to submit a technical and cost proposal. Notification by email or letter will be sent by the TPOC. Such invitation does not assure that the submitting organization will be awarded a contract. Those white papers not selected to submit a proposal will be notified in the same manner. Prospective offerors are advised that only Contracting Officers are legally authorized to commit the Government. All offerors submitting proposals will receive notification of their evaluation results within 45 days of submission. Offerors should email the TPOC and the Contracting Officer listed in Section VII, for status of their proposal after 45 days, if no such correspondence has been received. 3. DEBRIEFINGS: If a debriefing is requested in accordance with the time guidelines set out in FAR 15.505 and 15.506, a debriefing will be provided, but the debriefing content may vary to be consistent with the procedures that govern BAAs (FAR 35.016). Debriefings will not be provided for white papers. 4. ADMINISTRATIVE AND NATIONAL POLICY REQUIREMENTS: Depending on the work to be performed, the offeror may require a SECRET facility clearance and safeguarding capability; therefore, personnel identified for assignment to a classified effort must be cleared for access to SECRET information at the time of award. In addition, the offeror may be required to have, or have access to, a certified and Government-approved facility to support work under this BAA. This acquisition may involve data that is subject to export control laws and regulations. Only contractors who are registered and certified with the Defense Logistics Information Service (DLIS) at http://www.dlis.dla.mil/jcp/ and have a legitimate business purpose may participate in this solicitation. For questions, contact DLIS on-line at http://www.dlis.dla.mil/jcp or at the DLA Logistics Information Service, 74 Washington Avenue North, Battle Creek, Michigan 49037-3084, and telephone number 1-800-352-3572. You must submit a copy of your approved DD Form 2345, Militarily Critical Technical Data Agreement, with your white paper/proposal. 5. DATA RIGHTS: a. SBIR RIGHTS. The potential for inclusion of Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) or data rights other than unlimited on awards is recognized. In accordance with (IAW) the Small Business Administration (SBA) SBIR Policy Directive, Section 8(b), SBIR data rights clauses are non-negotiable and must not be the subject of negotiations pertaining to an award, or diminished or removed during award administration. Issuance of an award will not be made conditional based on forfeit of data rights. If the SBIR awardee wishes to transfer its SBIR data rights to the Air Force or to a third party, it must do so in writing under a separate agreement. A decision by the awardee to relinquish, transfer, or modify in any way its SBIR data rights must be made without pressure or coercion by the agency or any other party. b. NON-SBIR RIGHTS. 1. Non-SBIR data rights less than unlimited will be evaluated and negotiated on a case-by-case basis. Government Purpose Rights are anticipated for data developed with DoD-reimbursed Independent Research and Development (IR&D) funding. 2. The Air Force Research Laboratory is engaged in the discovery, development, and integration of warfighting technologies for our air, space, and cyberspace forces. As such, rights in technical data and noncommercial computer software (NCS) developed or delivered under this contract are of significant concern to the Government. The Government will therefore carefully consider any restrictions on the use of technical data, NCS, and NCS documentation which could result in transition difficulty or less-than full and open competition for subsequent development of this technology. 3. Third Party Software. DFARS 252.227-7014(d) describes requirements for incorporation of third party computer software. Any third party software (commercial and noncommercial) to be incorporated into a deliverable must be clearly identified in the proposal. Prior to delivery of any third party software, the contractor will obtain an appropriate license for the Government, and the written approval of the contracting officer. c. IDENTIFICATION & ASSERTION. IAW DFARS 252.227-7017, the Identification and assertion of Use, Release, or Disclosure Restriction provision applies. See AFRL/RI Specific Proposal Preparation Instructions for further guidance and samples. 6. REPORTING: a. Contract Applicable: Once a proposal has been selected for award, offerors will be given complete instructions on the submission process for the reports. b. FAPIIS Applicable: As required by 2 CFR 200 Appendix XII of the Uniform Guidance and FAR 9.104-6, non-federal entities (NFEs) are required to disclose in FAPIIS any information about criminal, civil, and administrative proceedings, and/or affirm that there is no new information to provide. This applies to NFEs that receive federal awards (currently active grants, cooperative agreements, and procurement contracts) greater than $10,000,000 for any period of time during the period of performance of an award/project. 7. NOTICE: The following provisions* apply: (a) FAR 52.209-11, Representation by Corporations Regarding Delinquent Tax Liability or a Felony Conviction under any Federal Law (b) DFARS 252.239-7017, Notice of Supply Chain Risk (c) DFARS 252.204-7008, Compliance with Safeguarding Covered Defense Information Controls (d) DFARS 252.203-7994, Prohibition on Contracting with Entities that Requirement Certain Internal Confidentiality Agreements-Representation * Please note that the current versions or deviations of the related clauses will be included in any resulting contract. 8. GRANT AWARDS ONLY : For efforts proposed as grant awards, offerors must provide an abstract in their proposal (not to exceed one page) that is publically releasable and that describes - in terms the public may understand - the project or program supported by the grant. If the proposal is selected for award, the DoD will publically post the abstract to comply with Section 8123 of the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2015 (Pub. L. 113-235). VII. AGENCY CONTACTS: All white paper and proposal submissions and any questions of a technical nature shall be directed to the cognizant TPOC as specified below (unless otherwise specified in the technical area): TPOC Name: Christopher Flynn Mailing Address: AFRL/RITA, 525 Brooks Rd., Rome, NY 13441-4505 Telephone: (315)330-3249 Email: Christopher.Flynn.6@us.af.mil Questions of a contractual/business nature shall be directed to the cognizant contracting officer, as specified below (email requests are preferred): Gail Marsh Telephone (315) 330-7518 Email: Gail.Marsh@us.af.mil Emails must reference the solicitation (BAA) number and title of the acquisition. In accordance with AFFARS 5301.91, an Ombudsman has been appointed to hear and facilitate the resolution of concerns from offerors, potential offerors, and others for this acquisition announcement. Before consulting with an ombudsman, interested parties must first address their concerns, issues, disagreements, and/or recommendations to the contracting officer for resolution. AFFARS Clause 5352.201-9101 Ombudsman (Jun 2016) will be incorporated into all contracts awarded under this BAA. The AFRL Ombudsman is as follows: Ms. Kimberly Yoder AFRL/PK 1864 4th Street Building 15, Room 225 Wright-Patterson AFB OH 45433-7130 FAX: (937) 656-7321; Comm: (937) 255-4967 Email: kimberly.yoder@us.af.mil All responsible organizations may submit a white paper which shall be considered.
 

Web Link

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Record

SN04479711-W 20170422/170420235507-f7992ae3c1afd009e79054c4bc791fdb (fbodaily.com)
 

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