D -- Accelerated Network Interface Cards and Enhanced Netflow Software for NOAA's Enterprise NIDS

The U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Acquisition and Grants Office (AGO) is posting this sources sought notice on behalf of the Office of the Chief Information Officer (CIO). Notice of Sources Sought for Equipment which is a combination of accelerated Network Interface Cards (NICs) and modified nProbe netflow generation software that can take advantage of the full speed of the accelerated NICs. The nProbe software will only work with nProbe accelerated NICs. This procurement supports the Network Intrusion Detection System (NIDS). It provides two components, accelerated NICs and specially modified software that takes full advantage of the NICs acceleration capabilities. These two components will be used in multiple servers per site as part of the NOAA Enterprise NIDS deployment. This component is a crucial piece in providing the ability to deploy a variety of NIDS technologies to inspect the data. NOAA's current enterprise NIDS deployment cannot support the anticipated increase in network utilization and network upgrades which will occur over the course of the next 3 years. In addition, the anticipated network upgrades and network utilization exceeds current IDS vendor offerings resulting in the need for the N-CIRT to engineer a solution. This solution adequately provides necessary coverage and has the flexibility to increase capacity if demand exceeds current expectations. This flexibility in the solution engineered by the N-CIRT minimizes the impact of overall cost at the larger installations if the anticipated increase in bandwidth utilization exceeds current predictions. Npulse Networks equipment: 2-port Gigabit XD Adapter Card (RJ45); 4-port Gigabit XL Adapter Card (RJ45); Subscription for use and support of precompiled nProbe binaries. THERE IS NO SOLICITATION AT THIS TIME. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL (RFP) AND ONE IS NOT CURRENTLY AVAILABLE. This request for capability information does not constitute a request for proposals and submission of any information in response to this market survey is purely voluntary; the Government assumes no financial responsibility for any costs incurred. Again, this is not a request for competitive proposals. A determination by the Government not to compete this action based on this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. Any information received in response to this notice will be considered for the purpose of determining whether to conduct a competitive procurement. Responding firms should provide one (1) electronic copy of a tailored capability statement by 12:00pm EST, Wednesday, September 5, 2007 via email to Matthew.Courtad@noaa.gov. Reference: ?NOAA Enterprise NIDS - Sources Sought? in the subject line. If there are any Small Businesses that may be Veteran or Women-owned that can provide this equipment at the performance needed by NOAA, a complete set-aside may be considered for this procurement.