Immigration & Naturalization Service, Procurement Division, 425 I St., NW, Room 2208, Washington, DC 20536

99 -- OPTICAL AND NON-OPTICAL CARD STOCK SOL HQ-99-07 DUE 031899 POC Robert Richards, (202)514-4573 The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) intends to issue a Request For Proposal (RFP) for optical and non-optical card stock, holograms, and protective laminate used to protect various immigration cards to Information Spectrum, Inc. (ISI). As part of its mission to enforce immigration laws, the INS produces a variety of cards to identify recipients of certain benefits, such as Permanent Resident Card (PRC), Border Crossing Card (BCC), Department of State LaserVisa, Employment Authorization Document (EAD), and the Student/Exchange Visitor Card (SEV). This action sets forth the immediate requirement for a one-time purchase of optical and non-optical card stock, holograms, and protective laminate from the current supplier, ISI. The purpose of this one-time purchase is to bolster card stock inventory to allow sufficient lead-time to introduce potentially new sources of supply for these items. The INS is planning a commercial item competitive selection process, examination of GSA schedules or some other competitive means of satisfying its long-term requirements for card stock and associated holograms, laminates and other card-specific supply items. The INS plans to purchase 2.8 million units of optical card stock, 1 million units of non-optical card stock, and all associated holograms and protective laminate from ISI. This one-time buy is expected to foster competition by allowing potential suppliers sufficient time to retool operations to meet the anticipated INS demand of approximately 5 million cards per year. The current INS schedule anticipates a competitive vendor selection in July 1999. This award date allows approximately four months before the first delivery of non-optical card stock and seven months for the first delivery of optical stock. -- The optical card stock required by the INS is the size of a credit card and contains a write-once-real-only memory (WORM) optical memory stripe that is encoded with cardholder information by the INS Integrated Care Production System (ICPS). ICPS encoding of the WORM stripe, additional printing, and the application of a hologram and a protective laminate personalizes the generic optical card stock by converting it into either the PRC or LaserVisa card for an individual recipient. The ICPS process also applies printing and holograms to personalize non-optical card stock into EAD and SEV cards for individual recipients. Non-optical card stock differs from the optical card stock in several ways, the most noticeable of which is the absence of the optical memory stripe on the back of the card. Like the optical card stock, the non-optical stock has security features introduced during card manufacture process. Optical card stock mus be manufactured in accordance with the Drexler European Licensees Association (DELA) optical card and all other standards incorporated by ISO/IEC 11693 and 11694. The composition and printing, on both the front and back of both the optical and non-optical cards, must be identical to that of the existing completed cards in circulation,all of which were supplied to the INS by ISI under a competitive contract awarded in FY 1996. -- This procurement is justified in accordance with FAR 6.302-1, Only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy the agency requirements. ISI is uniquely qualified to supply this optical and non-optical card stock, holograms and protective material. As the original (and current) supplier, ISI is the only vendor with a complete subcontractor network in place to begin production of all items immediately. Only by building up inventory now can the INS allow sufficient time for both a competitive selection process and the manufacture retooling and preparation time likely needed by any viable new source(s) of supply. Interested sources are invited to submit in writing, their qualification/capabilities. Such information will be used solely for the purpose of planning and pending competitive acquisition of card stock, and associated holograms and protective materials, for the INS ongoing requirements for these items. Posted 02/17/99 (W-SN299189). (0048)

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