Indoor Localization and Tracking Systems for First Responders

THIS IS A REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI) ONLY. This RFI is issued solely for information and market research planning purposes. This RFI shall not be construed as an obligation on the part of the Government. This is NOT a Request for Quotations or Proposals (RFQ or RFP). No solicitation document exists, and the Government may or may not issue a formal solicitation as a result of the responses received to this RFI. The Government will not pay for any response or demonstration expenses. All costs incurred responding to this RFI will be solely at the interested party's expense. Failure to respond to this RFI will not preclude participation in any future solicitation. In accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 15.201(e), responses to this notice are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Any organization responding to this notice should ensure that its response is complete and sufficiently detailed to allow the Government to determine the organizations capabilities. The Government's explicit intent through this RFI is to obtain general product information. The Government is not requesting and does not want to receive from respondents any proprietary data, trade secrets, business sensitive information, or information considered CONFIDENTIAL under 18 U.S.C. - 1905. The Government's constraint does not in any way relieve contractors from their responsibility to properly mark proprietary data when it is provided, nor does it alleviate any requirement for the Government to protect marked data. The Government is not obligated to protect unmarked data. The information provided in this RFI is subject to change and is not binding on the Government. All submissions become the property of the Federal Government and will not be returned. BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), National Urban Security Technology Laboratory (NUSTL) is seeking information on commercially available indoor localization and tracking technologies for emergency responders. This information is being sought for the DHS Science and Technology Directorate's System Assessment and Validation for Emergency Responders (SAVER) program which provides information on commercially available equipment to assist response organizations in equipment selection and procurement. The SAVER program develops knowledge products and conducts objective, practitioner-relevant, operationally oriented assessments and validations on commercially available equipment and systems. Relevant information will be shared nationally with federal, state, local, tribal and territorial response agencies. For further details on the SAVER program, visit the SAVER website at https://www.dhs.gov/science-and-technology/saver. SAVER provides information on equipment that falls within the categories listed in the DHS Authorized Equipment List (AEL). The AEL item number for the subject products is 04AP-02-OAPT, titled - System, Operations Area Personnel Tracking and Accountability. The target audience for this information is the emergency responder agencies and their respective purchasing agents. NUSTL is requesting information and conducting market research to identify potential vendors, manufacturers, or distributors of first responder indoor localization and tracking technologies. The products must be available to the first responder community. Products of interest for this RFI: Provide real-time localization and/or tracking of personnel indoors in three dimensions (X-Y-Z). This includes products or services that provide any of the following capabilities: Identifies a person's own position and assists in self-navigation Determines and transmits a person's location information to another user or incident command Tracks a person's indoor location over time Provides navigation capabilites Provides directional or proximity information to assist one user in locating another user Products such as incident management software platforms that display personnel location information from separate products are not included. Are applicable to first responder use cases Do not require pre-installation of dedicated infrastructure (e.g., system beacons) but can opportunistically leverage existing infrastructure (e.g., wifi access points, DAS, 5G, femtocells). Temporary deployment of beacons, repeaters, or antenna arrays is acceptable. Do not require pre-mapping of indoor floorplans May include technologies that provide indoor positioning as a service May include land mobile radio or cell phone based solutions if applicable Are currently commercially available or will be commercially available by the end of 2025. Responses to this RFI are solely for the purpose of market research and will be used for a market survey of commercially available first responder indoor localization and tracking products. No content in this RFI shall be interpreted as a commitment on the part of NUSTL to enter a contract with any respondent or to make any procurement. By submitting a response to this RFI, each respondent agrees that any cost incurred in responding to this request, or in support of activities associated with this RFI, shall be the sole responsibility of respondent. NUSTL shall incur no obligations or liabilities whatsoever, to anyone, for any costs or expenses incurred by the respondent in responding to this RFI. SUBMISSION OF INFORMATION Respondents are required to provide the following initial information via e-mail with subject line - Indoor localization and tracking to the technical point of contact, Cecilia Murtagh, at NUSTL@hq.dhs.gov: Company name Company address Point(s) of contact for follow-up (name, title, e-mail, and phone number) Business type (manufacturer or distributor) Product name and description Operating principle for location determination and expected indoor position accuracy Data connectivity requirements Description of how location information is presented or contextualized Limitations on number of tracked users (if applicable) Additional features (if applicable) Cost information (purchase price and if applicable, General Services Administration [GSA] schedule information). Respondents will receive an email confirmation of receipt and may be contacted for additional product details. All information received will be treated as public knowledge and may be used in SAVER publications; therefore, vendors should not submit proprietary information in response to this RFI. Comments or inquiries emailed should be directed to Cecilia Murtagh at nustl@hq.dhs.gov with the subject line " Indoor Localization and Tracking Systems for First Responders", copying the Office of Procurement Operations via email, specifically Mohammed Rizki, at mohammed.rizki@hq.dhs.gov and John Whipple, at John.Whipple@hq.dhs.gov Responses to this RFI must be submitted to NUSTL no later than 5:00 PM EST, November 20 , 2024. All technical comments, inquiries, and responses should be directed to Cecilia Murtagh via e-mail at NUSTL@hq.dhs.gov. Submissions must: Include the RFI number (70RSAT25RFI000039) in the subject line of the email Be a maximum of five (5) pages in length (counting the cover letter) Be in either read-only Word or PDF format Include Point of Contact (POC), phone number and email address of the person (in the body of the email) to be contacted regarding any correspondence between the Government and the Vendor. The POC shall be capable of addressing questions or issues associated with the submission and content of the RFI. Responses must have a cover letter that includes the following information Company Name Company Address Unique Entity Identifier (UEI) Number Company's Size and Socio-Economic Status information (using NAICS code 334511 Technical Point of Contact(s) (Name, title, email, and phone number) Contracting Point of Contact(s) (Name, title, email, and phone number) OTHER The submitted information will be assessed for inclusion in SAVER projects and reports. Determination as to an individual product's suitability will be made by NUSTL based on the objectives of this request. Therefore, requests for feedback should not be made through the Federal Business Opportunities (https://sam.gov) posting agency. Respondents may be contacted following submission for more detailed product information. Information provided may be reformatted for publication in SAVER program documents. If a vendor does not respond to additional requests for information, information may be marked as - Not Available or omitted from the SAVER documents. This RFI is for information gathering and planning purposes only and should not be construed as a Request for Proposal or solicitation of an offer. The Government does not intend to award a contract on the basis of this RFI or otherwise pay for the information solicited. Submission of vendor information constitutes consent to publication of that information in SAVER program documentation.