AFICC Multiplatform Distributed Virtual Training Environment

This Request for Information (RFI) is issued solely for information and planning purposes. In accordance with FAR 15.201(e) and FAR 52.215-3, responses to this notice are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. This RFI does not commit the Government to contract for any supply or service. Your response to this RFI will be treated as information only and will not be used as a proposal. No entitlement to payment, of direct or indirect costs, or charges to the Government will arise as a result of a contractor's submission of a response to this announcement or the Government's use of such information. The information provided may be used by the Government in developing its acquisition strategy and statement of work/statement of objectives/performance work statement and specifications. Interested parties are responsible for marking proprietary or competition sensitive information contained within their response. Contractors are encouraged to inform the Government of any barriers that would prohibit them from competing. Not responding to the RFI does not preclude participation in any future solicitations. The information provided in this RFI is subject to change and is not binding on the Government. The Government does not intend to issue a solicitation based on this RFI. The information sought in this RFI includes the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Code 611512, Flight Training, with a small business size standard of $30 million. SUMMARY: Air Force Installation Contracting Center 338 SCONS/PKD is conducting market research to gather information on a contractor's capability to deliver Commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) a multiplatform virtual training environment, including high fidelity, human-driven Air Traffic Control (ATC), providing student pilots, real-world ATC instructions in a realistic and demanding environment. The environment should also facilitate ATC training. This capability is required by Air Education and Training Command (AETC) and the 19th Air Force (AF) to be in place 1 March 2020. 19th AF, Headquartered at Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas, is responsible for training aircrews, remotely piloted aircraft crews, air battle managers, weapons directors, Air Force Academy Airmanship programs, and survival, escape, resistance, and evasion specialists to sustain the combat capability of the United States AF, other services and our nation's allies. 19th AF executes operational-level command and control of all formal aircrew flying training missions within AETC and provides Airmen with a 5th generation, cross-domain warrior mindset to the Combat Air Forces, Mobility Air Forces and Special Operations Air Forces. TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION: The Contractor shall deliver the capability for distributed AF flight simulators to fly concurrently in a hosted virtual environment, complete with ATC being provided in real time by controllers in full compliance with the current revision of FAA Order 7110.65. Virtual airspace must represent the airspace(s) where ATC simulator training is being conducted and represent virtually the identical display used in ATC facilities. Software must be compatible with AF flight simulators data network and voice system, mirroring real world very high frequency (VHF) and ultra-high frequency (UHF) operations. Simulator software compatibility requirements include, Lockheed Martin Prepar3d (v2.2+), and X-Plane 9, 10, 11 (Mac, Windows, Linux, 32 and 64 bit). Additionally, Contractor shall provide software for Linux and Windows that can be interfaced with any additional AF simulator platform through a published Interface Control Document (ICD). Contractor's ATC software must be capable of displaying SIDs, STARs, final approach courses, fixes, airways, low level routes, Special Use Airspace and custom video maps. Software architecture must allow for the delegation of responsibility of airspace and associated frequencies to one or more active controllers, including radar handoffs and point-outs between controllers. Pilots must be able to tune real world frequencies associated with the actual airspace, regardless of the ATC staffing configuration. Software suite must be capable of allowing one or more Remote Pilot Operators (RPO) to generate and manipulate numerous VFR and IFR aircraft in the same virtual environment for the purpose of ATC training. The system must provide audio recordings (either real time, or time-compressed with silences removed) of designated ATC positions or radio frequencies for quality assurance purposes. Contractor must have a system for recording and reporting pilot deviations, including aircraft call sign, date/time of possible deviation, flight plan information and a description of the specific incident. Software must include the capability to record aircraft profiles as flights are conducted on the network as well as the ability to play them back as recorded flights, including synchronizing playback with other recorded aircraft to permit grouping and looping of recordings. An example of such a capability would be a recorded profile of a low-level formation sortie, played back on a recurring basis such that students could participate in the formation flight even without any other live pilots being present. ATC staffing will be provided by the contractor with the option for AF to supply ATC staff for AF-managed airspace on an adhoc basis. The radio system must support the following: Line-of-sight considerations, including terrain masking and signal propagation Aircraft-to-aircraft communications Aircraft-to-ground communications up to 3 com radios per aircraft with simultaneous monitoring of all 3 radios realistic ATIS broadcasts with current real-world weather and associated runway configurations TRAINING REQUIREMENTS: Training simulations shall include the following: Ability to train on both instrument flight rules (IFR) and visual flight rules (VFR) Ability to file VFR and IFR flight plans Pick up IFR clearances on the ground or in the air Practice entering and flying ATC-initiated holding, published or otherwise Fly vectors-to-final or request full approaches Experience - one in, one out operations at non-towered airports Request cruise clearances, VFR-on-top, and block altitudes Practice emergency procedures, including receiving non-gyro vectors Experience flying to unfamiliar airports, and in unfamiliar airspace Plan and fly cross-country flights over multiple terrains Flight planning and decision making using real-world weather features Practice pilot cockpit resource management using the same kneeboard, checklist, charts used in the real-world aircraft Practice emergency procedures using random instrument or system failures and working with ATC to mitigate the emergency/failure(s) RESPONSE FORMAT: Please provide answers for each of the following questions, utilizing the existing numbering scheme for each response and limiting your total response for this RFI to no more than five (5) pages: 1. All interested parties are invited to provide the following information: A. Company Name, CAGE code and DUNS code. B. Mailing Address. C. Point of Contact (to include phone/fax and e-mail). D. Website, if applicable. E. State if your company is SAM registered under NAICS code 611512 or not. F. State whether your firm is large, small, small disadvantaged, woman-owned small, HUB-Zone, veteran owned, service-disabled veteran owned, or 8(a) certified business concern for NAICS 611512. 2. In accordance with FAR 2.101, describe your ability to meet the COTS item(s) for this type of requirement, explain if it meets the applicability below: - Commercially available off-the-shelf (COTS) item-- (1) Means any item or supply (including construction material) that is (i) A commercial item (as defined in paragraph (1) of the definition in this section); (ii) Sold in substantial quantities in the commercial marketplace; and (iii) Offered to the Government, under a contract or subcontract at any tier, without modification, in the same form in which it is sold in the commercial marketplace; and (2) Does not include bulk cargo, as defined in 46 U.S.C. 40102(4), such as agricultural products and petroleum products. ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION: Small Business (SB) Set-Aside Determination. The Government reserves the right to decide whether or not a SB set-aside is appropriate based on responses to this notice. In order for the Government to make a SB set-aside determination, it is emphasized that SB concerns provide sufficient written information to indicate their capability to successfully perform and manage all of the requirements of this magnitude. All interested firms that possess this capability are encouraged to respond to the notice by providing the information specified above no later than 4:00 PM (CST), on 24 Dec 19. Information must be provided in soft-copy form in Microsoft Word and/or Microsoft PowerPoint and shall be provided via e-mail. Forward responses and/or submit questions regarding this RFI to both of the POCs identified below. _______________________________________________________________________________________ UPDATE 29 JANUARY 2020 This is an amendment to RFI, FA300220XMDVT, posted on 10 Dec 19. Please reference the above information for all technical and software capabilities and training requirements. We have developed additional questions to facilitate our understanding of industry's capabilities. RESPONSE FORMAT: Please provide answers for each of the following questions, utilizing the existing numbering scheme for each response and limiting your total response for this RFI to no more than five (5) pages. The answers to questions 3-14 are not included in the five pages. 1. All interested parties are invited to provide the following information: A. Company Name, CAGE code and DUNS code. B. Mailing Address. C. Point of Contact (to include phone/fax and e-mail). D. Website, if applicable. E. State if your company is SAM registered under NAICS code 611512 or not. F. State whether your firm is large, small, small disadvantaged, woman-owned small, HUB-Zone, veteran owned, service-disabled veteran owned, or 8(a) certified business concern for NAICS 611512. 2. In accordance with FAR 2.101, describe your ability to meet the COTS item(s) for this type of requirement, explain if it meets the applicability noted above in questions #1. 3. The requirement stipulates an existing COTS* software product. Is your proposed environment operational today? How long has it been in operation, covering which airspace, and how many existing customers? Is the system operated by human air traffic controllers, or automated voice recognition? *Ref: Software solutions/capabilities addressed in the responses to the RFI meet the definition of Commercial IAW FAR 2.101 "Commercial item" (3)(ii) and (5)(i) - https://www.acquisition.gov/content/subpart-21-definitions 4. Does the existing environment have existing plugins/add-ons for X-Plane 11 and Prepar3D? 5. Does it have a mechanism (an API or published network protocol) to permit integration with legacy, custom training devices from other manufacturers? 6. Does your proposed solution currently have a video demonstration or trial options to test functionality? 7. Do you support UHF/VHF audio simulation including line of sight considerations and signal propagation? In other words, does the audio quality vary with signal strength, and does the signal strength vary based on distance and terrain? 8. Can multiple aircraft be logged in simultaneously to a single, virtual environment where pilots at a given base will see the other aircraft, hear the other pilots on the radios and be affected by the actions of the other pilots? 9. What is the quality assurance process to ensure that controllers are providing Air Traffic services in accordance with the current revision of the 7110.65? How closely can the environment model the local procedures for each base? 10. Can instructors communicate in real time with a supervisor or the air traffic controllers to request real-time modification to the services being received, such as requesting closure of an airport, a runway, a re-route, hold, shortcut, etc? 11. Are the audio interactions and flight tracks for each sortie recorded for subsequent debrief? 12. Is it possible for more than one ATC specialist to work the airspace to allow for increased scalability? Is it possible for one ATC specialist to handle several positions/frequencies at once from a single scope? Is the radio system configured such that controllers will only hear pilots who are in range and are on the appropriate frequency? In other words, do the frequencies dialed by the pilots actually matter? 13. Is the ATC radar scope of sufficient fidelity that it might be able to be used for ATC specialist training, or at least allow qualified AF ATC specialists to login and provide some of the ATC while you continue to manage the FAA-controlled airspace? 14. If you were to support this requirement, where would your employees perform the work? (City and state) All interested firms that possess this capability are encouraged to respond to the notice by providing the information specified above no later than 4:00 PM (CST), on 13 Feb 20. Information must be provided electronically in Microsoft Word and/or Microsoft PowerPoint and shall be provided via e-mail. Forward responses and/or submit questions regarding this RFI to both of the POCs identified below. Contract Specialist: Kenise Chaffin-Turner Email: kenise.chaffin-turner@us.af.mil Phone: 210-652-9221 Contracting Officer: Erin Mehaffie Email: erin.mehaffie.2@us.af.mil Phone: 210-652-7885