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FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF JULY 16, 2017 FBO #5714
DOCUMENT

99 -- TAC-17-42523 Inquiry Routing Information System (IRIS) New Contract - Attachment

Notice Date

7/14/2017
 

Notice Type

Attachment
 

NAICS

334111 — Electronic Computer Manufacturing
 

Contracting Office

Department of Veterans Affairs;Technology Acquisition Center;23 Christopher Way;Eatontown NJ 07724
 

ZIP Code

07724
 

Solicitation Number

VA11817Q1999
 

Archive Date

7/30/2017
 

Point of Contact

Dawn Eimont
 

E-Mail Address

0-9638<br
 

Small Business Set-Aside

N/A
 

Award Number

NNG15SC16B VA118-17-F-2132
 

Award Date

6/30/2017
 

Awardee

IMMIXTECHNOLOGY, INC.;8444 WESTPARK DR STE 200;MCLEAN;VA;22102
 

Award Amount

$5,965,399.93
 

Description

JUSTIFICATION FOR AN EXCEPTION TO FAIR OPPORTUNITY Contracting Activity: Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Acquisition Operations Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way Eatontown, New Jersey 07724 Description of Action: This proposed action is for a firm-fixed-price Delivery Order (DO) issued under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (SEWP) V Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) for renewal of the brand name Oracle Service Cloud and associated support services. Description of Supplies or Services: VA requires renewal of brand name Oracle Service Cloud. The Oracle Service Cloud is a Software as a Service (SaaS) which consists of Oracle software and applications that host and interface with VA s Inquiry Routing and Information System (IRIS), GI Bill, MyHealtheVet and E-BenefitsTechnical Support, and the VA System Administrators Help Desk. In addition to these hosting and interface services, VA also requires Oracle associated support services to include software maintenance and support to provide troubleshooting, minor updates, fixes and patches, and upgrades to the software and support of the licensing requirements to ensure that the existing software remains operational into the future. The Oracle Service Cloud platform hosts at its FedRamp-certified hosting site the IRIS application and its interfaces (GI Bill, MyHealtheVet and E-Benefits Technical Support, and the VA System Administrators Help Desk) and is heavily customized for VA s use, supports the operation of the Contact VA functions on the department website which has supported and continues to support the entire VA since its implementation in 2002. The IRIS and its interfaces together receive approximately 100,000 inquiries per month. In addition, this application is used in VA call centers by VA staff that creates inquiries on behalf of callers whose questions cannot be answered in real time during telephone conversations and must be forwarded to other locations for response. There are more than 1,000 VBA employees utilizing this application in call centers across the department. The IRIS also includes the department s Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) Knowledge Base, which receives more than 500,000 hits per month. Inquiries and Knowledge Base hits and sessions to IRIS and its interfaces run into millions per year. The IRIS has grown to include more than 482 internal mail groups across the department, including mailgroups at each medical center and VISN office, VBA Regional Offices and call centers, and numerous program offices. This system ensures that Veterans and other persons doing business with VA can contact the department to obtain information from the department, including but not limited to claims status, appeals status, answers to various questions regarding survivor benefits, health care, eligibility for VA services, GI Bill, Insurance, Loan Guaranty, Prosthetics, and other programs. Inquiries created in this system are routed to any one of 482 designated mail groups throughout VA. The licensing requirement reflects the growth of VA s internal user community; call centers expect to add and maintain more than 400 new staff to provide adequate service to our Veterans. In addition, a self-service scripting feature is included to provide consistent information about benefit eligibility to website users and also to be used by call center agents to supersede prior scripting and to provide universality to information provided. Additionally, associated support services are required to include secure hosting services for the IRIS software and maintenance support to ensure that these systems remain operational and function properly without interruption. The period of performance will be a 12 month base period starting July 1, 2017 with four 12-month option periods. Four 12-month option periods are required because VA does not anticipate replacing the current platform. Statutory Authority: The statutory authority permitting this exception to fair opportunity is Section 41 U.S.C. 4106(c)(2) as implemented by Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Subpart 16.505(b)(2)(i)(b) entitled, Only one awardee is capable of providing the supplies or services required at the level of quality required because the supplies or services ordered are unique or highly specialized. Rationale Supporting Use of Authority Cited: Based on extensive market research, as described in paragraph 8 of this document, it was determined that limited competition is available for the aforementioned brand name Oracle Service Cloud and associated support services. VA has utilized the brand name Oracle Service Cloud solution for IRIS and its interfaces for 15 years and currently has 482 internal mail groups across numerous department business lines, which are used by thousands of VA employees. Only the Oracle Service Cloud solution can meet all of VA s requirements since it has been heavily customized to VA s needs. VA s existing system was built in large part on Oracle software that has been heavily customized to function with only that software. This VA-specific functionality includes multiple complex queuing methods for workload distributions, complex cross-referencing of millions of contact records, and multiple scripting capabilities. No other brand name solution can provide these VA functional requirements. Oracle custom created a complex cross-referencing capability needed by VBA staff to enhance their internal capability for processing the workload coming from this application. This cross-referencing functionality addresses which contacts/individuals are involved with a specific inquiry and prevents the co-mingling of Veteran personally identifiable information with the records of other persons, and validates the identity and permissions if the requestor is inquiring about a third party. Multiple complex methods for queuing workloads were developed to meet varying needs of different workgroups in the IRIS and MHV & EBenefits Technical Support systems as well. The Oracle Service Cloud solution includes other numerous and substantial customizations, such as VA terminology and dynamic forms compatible with VA s mission, which optimize VA s use of this product in making it Veteran-centric. Any other software solution would need to be customized with duplication of those customizations existing in VA s use of the Oracle Service Cloud, since those customizations do not exist in any manufacturer s off-the-shelf product. No other brand name solution can provide any of these VA functional requirements. In addition, Oracle Service Cloud is the only solution that is interoperable and compatible with existing VA IRIS infrastructure and that of its interfaces. If VA introduces another brand of software to the existing infrastructure, the IRIS and its interfaces will no longer function because of the proprietary nature of the software running the system. Specifically, the IRIS application and its interfaces only communicate with the existing Oracle solution and no other brand name will work with it based on the proprietary constraints. The existing Oracle Service Cloud infrastructure is based on a proprietary code that only communicates with other Oracle brand products. If another product was used, it would not be able to function within the existing infrastructure and would not communicate with the current applications. If VA pursued an alternative brand name solution, the Contact VA mechanism (IRIS, GI Bill, MHV & E-Benefits Tech Support and VA System Admin Help Desk) would not work unless the agency gutted that infrastructure and replaced it with something else. Replacement of the Oracle Service Cloud software with another brand name software would result in extensive delivery delays estimated at approximately two years to develop and customize the application and all of its interfaces, extensively test all application functionality and multiple features, test for 508 compatibility and browser compatibility, migrate the application and all of its interfaces to another hosting facility, re-populate its Standard Text database, re-populate the FAQ Knowledge Base, re-train existing staff of thousands of employees across all business lines, produce written documentation and instruction guides, re-issue licenses and access codes, re-brand website pages, and modify a multitude of VA website links. The results of these implementation tasks including, but not limited to their impact on staff, development and testing requirements would result in estimated duplicated costs of at least $5M that could not be recovered through competition. These estimates are based on previous configuration and training efforts that VA has required in previously implementing Oracle Technologies brand name Oracle Service Cloud software to undertake in order to meet all of VA s existing and emerging requirements. Note that today s cost would be greater to produce. In addition to paying a new vendor to make all the changes, the existing system would have to remain in service (approx. $6.5 M a year to maintain Oracle contract for as long as necessary) so that this communication pathway would not be interrupted. Interoperability issues would render the previous customizations useless. There is no transition plan included in the contract since system usage continues to increase and satisfaction with this system is acceptable. There are no plans for replacement. This software is mission-critical to the entire department and is a major component of VA s customer service effort. Additionally, any source that will provide the aforementioned support services must have access to Oracle proprietary data, which access is currently not permitted. Access to this code is needed to ensure the services provided are properly configured and developed. Therefore, in addition to no other product meeting VA s needs, no other vendor is capable of providing the support services without access to the proprietary code. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in the market research section of this document. Limited competition is anticipated for the aforementioned brand name items and services. Furthermore, in accordance with FAR 5.3 the contract award will be synopsized on the Federal Business Opportunities (FBO) website. In addition, this Justification and Approval (J&A) will be made publicly available on FBO. Actions to Increase Competition: The Government will continue to conduct market research to ascertain if there are changes in the market place that would enable future actions to be competed. Specifically, VA will continue to engage Oracle to determine whether the source code may be released in open source so vendors could potentially access the source code and provide software maintenance. Market Research: The Government s technical experts performed market research in December 2016 on NASA SEWP V GWAC by researching other solutions similar to Oracle s to ascertain if these items could meet VA s requirements. Specifically, the Government s technical experts reviewed similar software from Salesforce s Desk.com, E-Gain, Freshdesk, Zoho, and Zendesk. None of the competitors solutions are interoperable and compatible with the existing infrastructure nor can they provide the full set of VA s functional requirements as previously stated in section 5 of this justification, which include complex routing and work queue routing capabilities, agent-scripting, and cross-referencing external user records. In addition, a Request for Information (RFI) which specified VA s functional requirements for this procurement was issued in February 2017 and only e-Gain replied. e-Gain conceded that its product did not have the features needed but the company wanted VA to be aware that it exists. VA invested heavily in this infrastructure over a long period of years and if the department pursued an alternative, the Contact VA mechanism (IRIS, GI Bill, MHV & E-BenefitsTech Support and VA System Admin Help Desk) would not work unless the agency gutted that infrastructure and replaced it with something else. Each interface on this platform has its own customer entry form and its own workflow process in addition to each pertaining to particular business considerations of those interfaces. Additional market research was conducted in April 2017 in order to determine if there is a reasonable expectation of obtaining quotes from two or more responsible Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) concerns. The Contract Specialist issued a RFI on the NASA SEWP V GWAC website to determine the number of SDVOSB resellers that provide Oracle products. Two responses were received from non-SDVOSB resellers. In addition, Oracle was directly contacted. The market research reveals that there are not two or more SDVOSBs or VOSBs within NASA SEWP capable of meeting the requirement.   Based upon this market research the subject solicitation will be issued for consideration of quotes from all Small Business GWAC holders in Groups B(1) Historically Underutilized Business Zone, B(2) SDVOSB, and Group C Small Business, GWAC holders under the Value Added Reseller North American Industry Classification System code 541519.   In the event that no quotes are received from Small Business GWAC holders, the solicitation shall be re-opened for consideration of quotes from GWAC holders across all SEWP V groups. If an award to other than a small business is contemplated under that circumstance, a waiver will be submitted by the Contracting Officer for approval. Other Facts:
 

Web Link

FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/notices/b3b5bed372de4dd0d0749a8949337693)
 

Document(s)

Attachment
 

File Name: NNG15SC16B VA118-17-F-2132 NNG15SC16B VA118-17-F-2132_1.docx (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=3659408&FileName=NNG15SC16B-002.docx)

Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=3659408&FileName=NNG15SC16B-002.docx

 

Note: If links are broken, refer to Point of Contact above or contact the FBO Help Desk at 877-472-3779.
 

Record

SN04580683-W 20170716/170714235449-b3b5bed372de4dd0d0749a8949337693 (fbodaily.com)
 

Source

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