AC&I Collaboration RFI for U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) C5ISR Center Research & Technology Integration (RTI)

Request for Information (RFI) Collaboration Tools for U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) C5ISR Center Research & Technology Integration (RTI) The Government (U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) C5ISR Center RTI) is requesting interested sources to provide information in the form of a white paper, capability briefing, and/or product description materials, which outlines and demonstrates the capability to meet the requirements described within this RFI. Information shall be submitted electronically to the points of contact identified and shall not exceed 20 MB for all items associated with the RFI response. This is a RFI only. This RFI shall not be considered an Invitation for Bid, Request for Task Execution Plan, Request for Quotation, or a Request for Proposal. There is no obligation on the part of the Government to acquire any products or services described in this RFI or its responses. Responses to this RFI will be treated only as information for the Government to consider. There is no payment for direct or indirect costs that are incurred in responding to this RFI. This request does not constitute a solicitation for proposals or the authority to enter into negotiations to award a contract. No funds have been authorized, appropriated or received for this effort. Interested parties are responsible for adequately marking proprietary, restricted or competition sensitive information contained in their response. The Government will not pay for the information submitted in response to this RFI. Generic capability statements will not be considered. Responses must address capabilities specific to this RFI. Requirement C5ISR Center RTI is seeking a software solution that enables collaboration within the tactical, operational, and/or strategic community of interest. The Army is currently working to transition from tent-based, static, monolithic command posts (CPs) to more agile, expeditionary, and physically dispersed CPs. In support of a dispersed CP, C5ISR Center RTID is seeking to evaluate a software-based collaboration tool to be used at CP echelons from battalion (BN) to Corps. Commanders and staff want the ability to share and communicate with other commanders and staff in a mixed environment. Additionally, staff sections must be able to perform Mission Command (MC) functions while dispersed. Multi-form Collaboration will enable the sharing of ideas and communication amongst multiple participants, locally and geographically dispersed, and promotes situational understanding between superiors, subordinates, and peers in the form of sketching, highlighting, verbal interaction, and gesturing through voice, text, chat, data, video, white boarding, map boarding, document collaboration, messages, and shared applications throughout the planning and execution processes. Operational Capability Statements 1. Collaboration Tools for U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) C5ISR Center Research & Technology Integration (RTI) Provide a consistent implementation of software-based tools that enables collaboration between Commanders, Leaders and Soldiers using disparate MC and Intelligence systems across all phases of Joint operations. These tools collectively allow users to share ideas and situational understanding between superiors, subordinates, and peers via sketching, highlighting, talking, listening, and gesturing through voice, text, chat, data, streaming video, white boarding, map boarding, messaging, and shared applications throughout the planning and execution process. Collaboration tools should allow users to create rich information visualizations to facilitate thinking and communicating about a problem on the fly. Provide a capability to support shift change briefs, Battle Update Briefs (BUB), Command Update Briefs (CUB), After Action Reviews, Rehearsals and the Mission Planning Process (e.g. Running Estimates, Mission Analysis, Course of Action (COA), COA Decision, and Plans/Orders briefings). Provide a white boarding capability to enable multi-form collaboration including free-form sketching, editing, co-editing and enrichment of information within the shared workspace, during briefings, and when sharing applications and displays. Provide a File Viewer application that supports importing, exporting, Create, Read, Update, Delete (CRUD), and two way sharing of office-type Documents (images, textual documents, slides, tables/spreadsheets) across echelons. This application shall also be integrated into the briefing tool and permit the ability for white boarding and highlighting on top of products shared via the File Viewer. Provide Highlighting capability throughout the shared workspace. Provide web conferencing capability with displays synchronized with talking, listening, & gesturing through voice and video capability. Provide Text & Chat capability. Provide Collaborative Data Sharing capability. Provide Map Boarding capability. Etc... 2. Shared Workspace A virtual environment in which two or more people can contribute to an effort by sharing ideas, collaborating, and/or editing products together, through the support of computer applications and collaboration tools within a network. Participants are able to see what others are working on, while communicating and collaborating on ideas in near real-time: Enables users to manage data and files located on servers within and between Command Posts and provides the ability for users to create, read, update, delete, query, process, synchronize, disseminate and share, log, archive, backup, and recover work products as documents, charts, spreadsheets, overlays, information sources, alerts, briefings, and specialized visualizations of information. Enables users to share their workspace (desktop or applications within) with others while having a shared capability to sketch, highlight, pen on top of the display while simultaneously communicating via voice and chat synchronized with user sketching, highlighting and drawing functions. On demand, the shared workspace capability and collaboration sessions shall be continuously persisted and recorded while active and, when completed, are backed up and/or archived and available to restore at user demand. The shared workspace shall permit the sharing of automated tactical alerts and notifications, consisting of both an audible and visual indication, that trigger Command Post Battle Drills that can be collaboratively executed based on a unit's Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). The Shared Workspace shall support concepts of voice gesturing, briefing owner, transitioning controls and presenters, managing participants, displaying and sharing workspace products including files, products, workspaces, layers, and bookmarks with a capability for participants to white board, highlight and sketch on information shared during a briefing. Provide collaborative sharing and synchronization of applications, application states and displays. View sharing should start in - WYSIWIS (What You See Is What I See) mode and should allow each user to switch to an individual display where they can change their own view (e.g., map zoom, table scroll, time range); information shown is still shared (and updated if any collaborating user changes, adds or removes items). Collaboration sessions in shared workspaces shall be visible and discoverable. Etc... 3. Scalability Enables collaboration over multiple environments and low bandwidth environments. Multiple collaboration sessions could occur at the same time. Must be able to operate on intermittent and low-bandwidth conditions. 4. Other Enabling Requirements Provide collaborative means to receive, display, share, develop, enrich, review, and approve Operational Graphics. Provide ability to monitor and display the status of collaborative services including application status, performance and application logs. Provided ability to notify users when network conditions impact collaboration between nodes and provide an intuitive means for users to restrict/reduce services/applications, sessions, shared workspace, and connections to external node functions to maintain minimum viable collaboration capability. Provide for permissions management and implementation to support concepts of general-purpose user, system administrators, knowledge managers and elevated permissions for collaboration managers. The system applications shall operate over wired and wireless networks. Must be hosted on premises at the edge node with the ability for cloud reach-back. Ability to achieve an accreditation in accordance with Risk Management Framework (RMF), though not required at current state. Additional Response Information In addition, in a separate file please provide capability statements that satisfy the requirements defined below: Company Profile: Describe what your company's core business is. Please include the following: company name, company address, points-of- contact information including name, phone number, e-mail address, number of employees, annual revenue history, office location, CAGE code, DUNS number, NAICS code(s), and current business size status under contracts. Corporate Experience: Prior/current Department of Defense (DoD) corporate experience performing efforts of similar size and scope within the last two years, including contract number, organization supported, indication of whether as a prime or subcontractor, contract value, Government point of contact, and a brief description of the specific task areas in the referenced contract as it relates to the services described herein. Please indicate whether you have a Communications Security (COMSEC) Account and specific experience managing COMSEC, Controlled Cryptographic Items, and classified equipment. Capabilities: Describe experience and capabilities in regards to your company's ability to manage DoD tasks of this nature and size. Please provide a narrative to address the following: i. Post Production Software Support & System Engineering Expertise. Must provide post production software support and deployment software support to include: System engineering software development, software upgrades, testing, integration, training and help desk support for new software components. ii. Security Requirements. The contractor will be required to have at a minimum, a Secret Security Clearance for all personnel with exception to administrative support personnel. The contractor shall also be required to have at a minimum, a Secret Facility Clearance and Secret Safeguarding. iii. Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals and Interactive Multimedia Instruction. Describe your experience with developing and updating Army technical manuals, quick reference guides, Interface Design Documents, Interface Control Documents, Interface guides, Operator guides, and Web-based/Computer based trainers for software systems in accordance with to the latest Military Standards and Army Regulations. iv. National Security Agency (NSA) Requirements. Describe your company's experience with the NSA software signature process and NSA required software security documentation. v. Cybersecurity. Describe your company's experience with Risk Management Framework accreditations, Information Assurance Vulnerability Alert updates and Security Technical Implementation Guides. Submission of Responses. Questions related to this RFI shall be submitted no later than 5PM EST on 27 June 2023. Responses shall be submitted no later than noon (12PM) EST on 05 July 2023. All questions and responses shall be submitted via email to Brendan Schafer, brendan.m.schafer.civ@army.mil. Please also include the Contract Specialist, Andrew Pilone, (Andrew.m.pilone.civ@army.mil) and the Contracting Officer, Gregg Martin, (gregg.g.martin.civ@army.mil). For responses containing Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI), please submit an email to the above points of contact to request DoD SAFE drop-off for secure submittal.