National Institute of Standards & Technology, Acquisition & Assistance Div.,100 Bureau Drive Stop 3572, Bldg. 301, Rm B117, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-3572

D -- INTERNET ASSIGNED NUMBERS AUTHORITY SOL 52SBNT9C1020 DUE 021899 POC Teresa A. Reefe, Contract Specialist (301) 975-6364 or Lisa K. Jandovitz, Contracting Officer (301) 975-6344 WEB: NIST Contracts Homepage, http://www.nist.gov/admin/od/contract.htm. E-MAIL: NIST Contracts Office, Contract@nist.gov. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), on behalf of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) intends to award a contract under the authority of 41 USC 253(c)(1), only one responsible source, to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) for operation of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority. The Department of Commerce has initiated an effort to transition the technical management of Internet Names and Addresses from the Government to the private sector. In June, 1998, the Department issued its Statement of Policy which outlined the steps of the transition. The Department through NTIA has since entered into a joint project agreement (15 U.S.C. 1525) with ICANN, a non-profit entity. Pursuant to this JPA, the parties will "jointly design, develop and test the mechanisms, methods and procedures that should be in place and the steps necessary to transition management responsibility for DNS functions now performed by or on behalf of the U.S. Government to a private sector non-profit entity". NTIA is initiating this contract action to fulfill its need for continuity of services related to the technical management of Internet Names and Addresses during the transition described in the Statement of Policy and the JPA. This particular aspect of the technical management, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), is currently covered in a contract between the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the University of Southern California (USC) in project known as Teranode Network Technology (TNT). On December 24, 1998, USC, entered a transition agreement under which ICANN acquired the expertise and resources to perform the IANA function described in the TNT contract. Pursuant to its agreement with USC, ICANN now possesses the unique attributes and characteristics specific to the IANA functional tasks. To ensure the success of the transition described in the Statement of Policy and the JPA, the Department must ensure the continuityof the services necessary to support the IANA function. Further, ICANN has unique attributes to fulfill these tasks in compliance with the principles in the Department's Statement of Policy, including comprehensive, public, and transparent processes, mechanism and structures for making policy determinations that the U.S. Government seeks to have performed during the transition. The period of performance is estimated to be from date of contract award through September 30, 2000. Posted 01/04/99 (W-SN284696). (0004)

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