United States Department of Agriculture
Limited Sources Justification
For an Order/BPA Exceeding the Simplified Acquisition Threshold
FAR 8.405 Federal Supply Schedules (FSS)
Multiple Award Schedule Program
1. Identification of the agency and the contracting activity.
United States Department of Agriculture, Departmental Administration, Office of Contracting and Procurement, Procurement Operations Division, 301 S. Howes Street, Suite 321, Fort Collins, CO 80521.
2. The nature and/or description of the action being approved.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Nutrition Service requests limited source Federal Supply Schedule (FSS) order for Operations and Maintenance (O&M) services to the Alfresco (ALF) platform. The USDA proposes to issue a limited source Federal Supply Schedule (FSS) order on a firm fixed-price basis with Armedia LLC.
3. A description of the supplies or services required to meet the agency's needs.
The scope of work requires the contractor to provide Operations and Maintenance (O&M) services for existing and upcoming applications residing on and/or integrating with the ALF platform. The work in each O&M release may leverage and build upon the concepts and/or deliverables from other projects or contracts. All resulting software releases shall include, at a minimum, Release Notes which summarize code, features and functions changed, and a general description of the requirements initiating the production release.
The overall requirements and expectations of these services include:
Maintaining high functioning streamlined code;
Addressing user feedback and improving the user experience with enhancements/releases which do not exhibit abnormal behavior contrary to its intended or written specification, do not negatively impact users or other features/data contained in the Application, and result in 99% bug-free software releases
Ensuring the application remains modernized and compatible with current and new versions of the agency standard for web browsers, operating systems, and devices.
Making recommendations and implementing approved technical architecture changes to optimize application stability, flexibility, performance, and scalability.
Possessing the requisite expertise to maintain the ALF platform and child applications at their current environment, or future-planned environment.
Preparing and maintaining system artifacts as detailed in subsequent sections
Decommissioning the Alfresco platform and supporting the migration into the new AWS S3 environment.
4. The authority and supporting rationale.
The following circumstance justifies limiting the source under FAR 8.405-6:
FAR 8.405-6(a)(1)(i)(C) In the interest of economy and efficiency, the new work is a logical follow-on to an original Federal Supply Schedule.
5. A statement demonstrating the unique qualifications of the proposed contractor or the nature of the action requiring the use of the authority.
If 8.405-6(a)(1)(i)(C) is the proposed authority
The previous FSS order 12319819F0094 was placed in accordance with the applicable FSS ordering procedures. Currently the Alfresco ECM platform is at end of life and FNS is trying to finish the decommissioning of the platform. For a new vendor to pick-up the decommissioning with only four months left to finish would create duplication of costs towards a system that is being decommissioned. The efficiency to be achieved by limiting the source is to get the platform down quickly and reduce the cost to the Government.
It is a logical follow-on to have the vendor finish the decommission. This added time is due to unforeseen delays.
Armedia has been supporting the Alfresco ECM platform since 2015. The platform is at end of life and is in the process of being replaced. As a strategic partner of Alfresco, a partner of AWS and the subject matter experts on the ECM platform, Armedia is uniquely qualified to continue providing the operations and maintenance services on the Alfresco platform, as well as the services involved in decommissioning the platform. Armedia's capabilities in Alfresco and their extensive knowledge of the Alfresco ECM platform, the FNS environment, data migration and the new AWS S3 environment position them to have the required capabilities and knowledge to enable FNS to smoothly transition to AWS with minimal downtime and interruption of service on these mission critical systems.
6. A determination by the ordering activity Contracting Officer (CO) that the order represents the best value consistent with FAR 8.404(d).
Contracting Officer has considered the level of effort and mix of labor proposed to perform the specific task(s) needed, and determine that the proposed order represents a reasonable price and is be the best value for the Government, price and other factors considered. Additional pricing discounts will be negotiated as well.
7. A description of the market research conducted among schedule holders and the results or a statement of the reason market research was not conducted.
Market research was not conducted among schedule holders. In this unique situation of only a 4-month contract to finish and decommissioning a platform. No other vendor could finish the work faster than the incumbent resulting in cost savings.
8. Any other facts supporting the justification.
USDA wants to spend minimal funds on decommisioning ALF platform and the best way to do this is to have the incumbet, who has all the clearnaces and knowledge, finish thw work. There will be no more contracts after this for decommissioning the ALF platform.
9. A statement of actions the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers to competition if subsequent acquisitions are anticipated.
If there is an unforeseen subsequent acquisition/orders for this requirement it will be competed around 7/2022.
