Spectrum Forward Consortium Other Transaction Agreement (OTA)

1.0 Introduction The Army Contracting Command - New Jersey (CCNJ) on behalf of the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense, Research, and Engineering (USD R&E) is releasing this Solicitation to enter into a Prototype Other Transaction Agreement (OTA) with a single Consortium, referred to hereafter as the - Agreement. The purpose of the Agreement is to establish terms and conditions by and between the Government and the Consortium. The Agreement shall be executed under the authority of 10 U.S.C. 2371(b), which authorizes the Secretary of the Army to carry out prototype projects that are directly relevant to enhancing the mission effectiveness of military personnel and the supporting platforms, systems, components, or materials proposed to be acquired or developed by the Department of Defense, or to improvement of platforms, systems, components, or materials in use by the armed forces. To comply with 10 U.S.C 2371(b), the Government will only award prototype projects that meet the following criteria: - At least one nontraditional defense contractor or nonprofit research institution participating to a significant extent; or - All significant participants in the transaction, other than the Federal Government, are small business, nonprofit research institution or nontraditional defense contractors; or - At least one third of the total cost of the prototype project is to be paid out of funds provided by the parties to the transaction other that the Federal Government; or - The senior procurement executive for the agency determines in writing that exceptional circumstances justify the use of a transaction that provides for innovative business arrangements or structures that would not be feasible or appropriate under a contract, or would provide an opportunity to expand the defense supply base in a manner that would not be practical or feasible under a contract. This Solicitation is a request for proposals for a Consortium whose membership possesses a collective expertise in the following areas to enable enhanced operational capability for systems that transmit and receive in the electromagnetic spectrum environment: - Ubiquitous Connectivity - Cognitive Spectrum Access & Sharing - Cybersecurity - Radio Frequency-Free Space Optics Cooperative Systems - Autonomous Systems (Ground/Air/Maritime) - Internet of Things (Narrow Band/Critical/Massive) - Electronic Warfare - Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) - Software Defined Radios/Networking/Architectures - Radar Systems - Digital Signal Processing - Microelectronics - Software Reconfigurability - Nanotechnology - Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence - Autonomy/Robotics - Biotechnology - Big Data Analytics - Edge and Cloud Computing - Augmented/Virtual/Mixed Reality - Location Detection - 3D Printing/Additive Manufacturing - 5th generation (5G) information communications technologies, products, and services Expenditures for projects awarded to Members shall be handled as a direct pass through for the Consortium with no indirect cost or fee being applied. The Consortium shall act as the liaison between the Government and the Member. The agreement between the Member and the Consortium shall be established to facilitate payments to the Members for the specific projects funded by the Government. In no circumstance shall the Member be considered a subcontractor to the Consortium nor shall the value/cost of the project be considered as an incurred cost of the Consortium. The handling of project expenditures described above apply to any party representing the Consortium (i.e. Consortium Management Firm). This competitive solicitation is seeking a single Consortium that includes industry, academic, non-profit, and for-profit entities in order to enhance our warfighters survivability, readiness, lethality, and combat effectiveness through industrial and academic research, development, and technology demonstrations. This Solicitation constitutes the only solicitation that will be released. 2.0 Technology Overview 2.1 Technology Objectives The Consortium Members shall perform coordinated research and development projects designed to accelerate streamlining and upgrading of communications infrastructure, improving efficient spectrum utilization, and advancing microelectronics to enable protected and resilient networks. The focus will be on the following Technology Objectives: - Accelerate maturation, integration, adaptation, and deployment of 4th Industrial Revolution (e.g. augmented reality, big data analytics, Internet of Things, Cloud Computing, etc.) and digital technology enhancements that contribute to dominant operational capability; - Accelerate maturation, adaptation, and deployment of dual-use information communications infrastructure and network enhancements that contribute to operational capability and commercially available applications; - Accelerate and support development/adoption of prototype policy, regulation, and standards that enable effective, coexistent military and commercial use of congested spectrum; - Provide for system protection and resiliency against adversarial action while in homeland and/or deployed status; - Cooperatively, dynamically, and/or cognitively share spectrum with other spectrum dependent systems operating in the same frequency band without causing interference; - Operate effectively in spectrum environments that are congested with users in co-located bands in a manner resilient to interference; - Operate in spite of adversary attempts to deny spectrum utilization while in homeland and/or deployed status; - Operate in spite of adversary attempts to disrupt and disable spectrum dependent systems; and - Operate in spite of adversary penetration, compromise, or exploitation of networks or systems. 2.2 Technology Areas The Government is seeking a single Consortium that provides expertise in certain Technology Areas. Below is a list of the Technology Areas: 2.2.1 Massive Multiple Input, Multiple Output (MIMO): Use of large antenna arrays to simultaneously serve many end users by leveraging smart processing at the array to achieve greater network capacity. 2.2.2 3D Beam-Forming: An interference coordination method that provides the ability to form and direct antenna patterns in both vertical and horizontal directions to provide more degrees of freedom in supporting end user devices in the network. 2.2.3 Waveform diversity: The use of various waveforms (signals) in both transmitter and receiver design for improving the overall performance such as detection and/or identification of targets in interference and noise. 2.2.4 Multi-Function Radio Frequency (RF): Techniques to integrate multiple functions (e.g. communications, sensing, etc.) performed through transmitting and receiving radio frequency energy via reconfigurable hardware and software. 2.2.5 Cognitive Spectrum Sharing: Spectrum dependent systems using cognitive radios that can dynamically utilize idle spectrum without affecting the rights of primary spectrum users to enable more users to share available spectrum. 2.2.6 Machine Learning: An application of software programming that provides systems the ability to automatically learn and improve performance based on experience without explicitly being programed. 2.2.7 Cognitive Sensing: Sensors have cognitive abilities enabling the adaptation of performance parameters in accordance with changes in the surrounding environment to improve sensing performance. 2.2.8 "Smart Technologies: Technologies that allow sensors, databases, and wireless access to collaboratively and cognitively sense, adapt, and provide services to users within the environment. 2.2.9 Virtual Reality: Technology that creates a complete immersion into a computationally generated digital virtual environment/experience that shuts out the physical world. 2.2.10 Augmented Reality: Technology that adds computationally generated, digital elements to a real world environment. 2.2.11 Mixed Reality: Technology that enables the merging of real and virtual worlds to produce new environments and visualizations in which physical and digital objects co-exist. 2.2.12 Digital Twin: A digital replica of a living or non-living physical entity that bridges the physical and the virtual world, such that data is transmitted seamlessly allowing the virtual entity to exist simultaneously with the physical entity. The digital twin exists as a continuously updating digital simulation that changes as the physical counterpart changes. 2.2.13 Narrow Band Internet of Things (NB IoT): A low power, wide area network (LPWAN) 3GPP technology standard focused on indoor coverage characterized by low cost, long battery life, and high connectivity density. 2.2.14 Massive Internet of Things (M IoT): Machine to Machine connectivity characterized by low cost, low energy, small data volumes, and massive numbers of connected nodes. 2.2.15 Critical Internet of Things (C IoT): Machine to Machine connectivity characterized by ultra-reliability, very low latency, and very high availability. 2.2.16 Device-to-Device (D2D) Communications: Ability for user equipment in close proximity to one another to communicate using direct link rather than their radio signal traveling through base stations or the core network. Provides for ultra-low latency in communications due to shorter signal traversal path. 2.2.17 Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks (VANETs): Use of wireless local area networks (WLAN) to connect a large number of vehicles in an ad hoc network to enable inter-vehicular communication (vehicles sharing data with vehicles). 2.2.18 Vehicular Ad-Hoc Network (VANET) Cloud: A generic cloud computing model for vehicular ad hoc networks that enables ubiquitous sharing of computing resources. 2.2.19 Autonomous Navigation: The activity of autonomously defining a trajectory through the environment in order to reach a specified location while dealing with any possible unexpected obstacles, to include object recognition, obstacle avoidance, partial automation, conditional automation, up to full automation. 2.2.20 Wireless Software Defined Network (SDN): A network architecture that decouples the control plane, which makes network forwarding decisions, from the data plane, which forwards data, to enable more coordinated decision making for improved network performance. 2.2.21 Network Function Virtualization: A technique to abstract network functions, allowing software on standardized compute nodes to install and control the network functions. Enables decoupling of network functions from proprietary hardware so the functions can run in software on standardized hardware. 2.2.22 Heterogeneous Networks (HetNets): A network connecting computers and other devices with different operating systems and/or protocols using different access technologies. 2.2.23 Network Ultra-Densification: The technique of deploying many smaller network cells to enable more overall users, lower latency, and increased data capacity. 2.2.24 Next Generation Radio Access Networks: Next generation RANs will include Cloud RAN (CRAN), Distributed RAN (DRAN), and Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS) to meet the performance and scale requirements of the heterogeneous networking environment. 2.2.25 5G: An advanced wireless technology standard defined by 3GPP that enables human to human communication; human to machine communication, and machine to machine communication often relying upon fixed, ground based communications infrastructure. 2.2.26 Cyber-Physical Systems: Integrations of computation, networking, and physical processes. Embedded computers and networks monitor and control the physical processes, with feedback loops where physical processes affect computations and vice versa. 3.0 Roles and Responsibilities 3.1 Government Responsibilities. The Government will provide strategic objectives, technical requirements/gaps, and tactical guidance through competitive solicitations for 10 U.S.C. 2371(b) prototype projects that will be issued to all Members of the Consortium. The Government will be solely responsible for the screening, evaluation, and selection of proposals. The Government will have the sole responsibility of accepting or rejecting proposals in accordance with the criteria of the individual project solicitation, and performing cost and/or price analysis of the proposals. The Government will monitor the technical work performed for each individual prototype project awarded to Consortium Members. 3.2 Consortium Member Responsibilities. Consortium Members may provide proposals in response to any competitive solicitation to address the Government's science, technology, spectrum policy, and standards objectives. Each Consortium Member or team of members that has a proposal selected and funded will perform the agreed upon activities defined in the Statement of Work (SOW). Consortium Members may: (1) share in the funding as Cash Contribution or In-Kind Contribution; (2) contribute their own resources including personnel; and (3) under special circumstances, contribute materials, facilities, equipment or instrumentation. Consortium Members may not negotiate the previously agreed to terms and conditions of the Agreement between the Government and the Consortium. 3.3 Consortium Responsibilities. The Consortium shall be responsible for activities delineated in Section 8.0 of this Solicitation. The Consortium will assist the Government in obtaining and sharing both Government and Consortium Member feedback, recommendations and relevant information. The Consortium will provide a forum for Members to organize and meet with Government personnel to exchange technical, policy, programmatic and standard information, and to identify opportunities to strengthen the industrial base in spectrum related technologies and tradecraft. As participants in technical concept assessments, the Consortium will conduct surveys for assessment team participation from Members, and support technical assessment team sessions. Additionally, the Consortium will serve as the single point of contact with the Government for activities, such as distributing competitive solicitations for each project to the entire membership, and assisting Consortium Members with submission of documents in response to those competitive solicitations. The Consortium shall not be responsible for screening or otherwise accepting or rejecting Consortium Member's responses to competitive solicitations nor shall the Consortium be responsible for performing any cost and/or price analysis of the responses. The Government will communicate directly with the Members in regard to the evaluation and negotiation of cost proposals. Additionally, the Consortium will be responsible for administrative functions associated with the life cycle of the project awards. In no circumstance shall reimbursement of these costs be structured as a fee based on the price of the individual project awarded to the Consortium Member. Expenditures for projects awarded to Members shall be handled as a direct pass through for the Consortium with no indirect cost or fee being applied. The Consortium shall act as the liaison between the Government and the Member. The agreement between the Member and the Consortium shall be established to facilitate payments to the Members for the specific projects funded by the Government. In no circumstance shall the Member be considered a subcontractor to the Consortium nor shall the value/cost of the project be considered as an incurred cost of the Consortium. The handling of project expenditures described above apply to any party representing the Consortium (i.e. Consortium Management Firm). 3.4 Consortium Member Agreement (CMA). Each Consortium Member shall become a signatory to the CMA before the Consortium Member will be allowed to respond to any competitive solicitations for 10 U.S.C. 2371(b) prototype projects. The CMA shall govern the operation of the Consortium and its member organizations. Through the execution of a Consortium Member Agreement, Consortium Members shall agree to be bound to the terms and conditions of the Agreement, when and if they receive a project award. 3.5 Security. Work by the Consortium Member may involve access to Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) as well as information classified as - Confidential or - Secret. The Consortium Member and their employees shall comply with: (1) the Security Agreement (DD Form 441), including the National Industrial Security Program Operation Manual (DoD 5220.22M); (2) any revisions to that manual that may be issued; (3) the Agreement Security Classification Specification (DD Form 254), if included; and (4) all other security requirements specific to the individual projects, including, but not limited to, Operational Security (OPSEC) plans. Any Classified information shall be handled in accordance with DoD 5220.22M, the National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual. 3.6 Miscellaneous. By submitting a proposal, each Offeror agrees to the Consortium roles and responsibilities as defined herein. 4.0 Terms and Conditions The Consortium and each of its Members shall comply with the terms and conditions of the Agreement. The purpose of the Agreement is to establish terms and conditions by and between the Government and the Consortium to streamline the process for prototype project awards to Consortium Members. The Consortium roles and responsibilities to be performed on behalf of and paid for by the Government will be limited to those described in Section 3.3 of this Solicitation. The Agreement will commence upon the date of bilateral execution by and between the Government and the Consortium, and will have a term of five (5) years or $2.5B ceiling value, whichever occurs first. Please note that the specific terms and conditions of the resulting Agreement will be negotiated and finalized with the selected Consortium prior to award. If the Government cannot reach agreement with the selected Offeror on the terms and conditions of the Agreement, then the Government reserves the right to award to an alternative Offeror. Award of an Agreement to the best overall Consortium does not guarantee any projects will be awarded under the Agreement to Consortium Members. 5.0 Evaluation Criteria The Government anticipates the award of an Agreement resulting from this competitive solicitation to the responsible and responsive Offeror that provides the best overall Consortium to the Government. The Government will review all submissions and perform an integrated assessment of each submission to make a determination as to which Consortium best meets its needs, based on the evaluation criteria. The following three (3) Factors shall be evaluated: Factor 1: Consortium Membership and Expertise Factor 2: Consortium Structure and Management Factor 3: Cost/Price For evaluation purposes, Factor 1 is more important than Factor 2; Factor 1 and Factor 2, when combined, are significantly more important than Factor 3. Factors 1 and 2 will receive an evaluation rating in accordance with Section 6 below and will be supported by a narrative justification. Factor 3 will be evaluated but will not receive an adjectival rating. The Government reserves the right to award to other than the lowest priced Offeror, or to other than the Offeror with the highest rating if determined that to do so would result in the selection of the best overall consortium. A. Factor 1: Consortium Membership and Expertise: The Government will evaluate the Consortium's collective expertise and ability to support the Technology Objectives discussed in Section 2.1 and Technology Areas discussed in Section 2.2. The Government will evaluate the number and quality of the current Consortium Members, which includes the proportion that are traditional versus nontraditional defense contractors, and members of industry versus members of academia. The Government will evaluate the extent to which the Consortium maximizes the ease of entry for qualified entities to become members and actively compete for technology projects. The Government will evaluate the Consortium's demonstrated current capability, as well as future plans for member retention and growth. The Government will evaluate the Consortium's demonstrated capability to promote the active participation and engagement of its Members to enable information sharing, participation in Government technical information sharing, and other means of membership collaboration. B. Factor 2: Consortium Structure and Management. The Government will evaluate the Consortium's organizational structure, mission, vision, strategic objectives and performance metrics. The Government will evaluate the Consortium's level of interaction/oversight with its Members, the ability to assist new and non-traditional Members to understand the DoD customer, mission, and processes, the ability to share information across the membership, the ability to foster teaming among the membership, and the ability to provide logistical and information support to membership and member-customer functions, (i.e. the ability to coordinate and host Industry Days and Collaboration Days). The Government will evaluate how the Consortium plans to meet the roles and responsibilities described in Section 3.3. C. Factor 3: Cost/Price. The Government will assess if the proposed price is realistic, reasonable, and complete. The Cost/Price Factor will not have an adjectival rating assigned. A total evaluated price will be used for purposes of evaluation to determine the most advantageous proposal to the Government. The total evaluated price will be computed by summing the evaluated prices computed based upon a cost realism analysis for each Contract Line Item Number (CLIN). The evaluated price for each CLIN is the sum of probable cost, based upon a cost realism analysis and the proposed fixed fee. The total evaluated price will be rounded to the nearest whole dollar. The probable cost will be determined as follows: (a) The Government will perform a cost realism analysis of the proposed costs for each CLIN to determine whether the proposed cost elements are realistic for the work to be performed, reflect a clear understanding of the requirements, and are consistent with the proposed method of performance described in the Offeror's proposal to determine the most probable cost of performance. (b) The probable cost may differ from the proposed cost and will reflect the Government's best estimate of the cost of any action that is most likely to result from the Offeror's proposal. If the Offeror fails to support any portion of the proposed costs, the Government reserves the right to adjust the costs to the higher of the proposed amount or readily available data in the cost realism position. The probable cost will be determined by adjusting each Offeror's proposed cost to reflect any additions or reductions in cost elements to realistic levels based on the results of the cost realism analysis. 6.0 Evaluation Rating Factors 1 and 2 identified in Section 5.0 will receive an evaluation rating supported by narrative justification, which will reflect the Government's overall confidence in a Consortium's ability to meet all of the requirements. Merit Rating Evaluation Definition Outstanding The proposal meets or exceeds the requirements and indicates an exceptional approach and understanding of the requirements. The benefits far outweigh any shortcomings. The risk of unsuccessful performance is very low. Good The proposal meets the requirements and indicates a thorough approach and understanding of the requirements. The benefits outweigh the shortcomings. The risk of unsuccessful performance is low. Acceptable The proposal meets the requirements and indicates an adequate approach and understanding of the requirements. The benefits and shortcomings are offsetting, or shortcomings will have little or no impact on agreement performance. The risk of unsuccessful performance is no worse than moderate. Unacceptable The proposal does not meet the requirements and contains multiple shortcomings that are not offset by benefits and/or one or more deficiencies. The risk of unsuccessful performance is high. The proposal is not awardable. A benefit means an aspect of an Offeror's proposal that enhances performance, provides added value, and/or reduces schedule or performance risk. A shortcoming means an aspect of an Offeror's proposal that does not provide adequate performance, does not provide added value, and/or increases schedule or performance risk. A deficiency means a material failure of an Offeror's proposal to meet a Government requirement. Factor 3 will result in a total probable cost and fixed fee for each Offeror. 7.0 Submission Instructions 7.1 Submission Deadline Proposals are due no later than 04 May 2020 1:00 PM EST. Proposals shall be emailed to sean.p.mcavoy.civ@mail.mil. Alternatively, offerors may submit their proposal through DoD SAFE Secure Access File Exchange (https://safe.apps.mil). In order for an offeror to initiate and complete a proposal submission through the DoD SAFE, they must request and receive a drop-off request code from the Agreement Officer. Drop-off requests must be submitted to the Agreements Officer by email to sean.p.mcavoy.civ@mail.mil no later than two (2) hour before to the closing of the solicitation. The proposal shall stand on its own merit. Only information provided in the proposal will be used in the evaluation process. Offerors are responsible for including sufficient details to permit an integrated assessment of the Offeror's proposal in response to the evaluation criteria. The proposal must not merely repeat the solicitation requirements, but rather must provide convincing documentary evidence in support of conclusive statements of how roles and responsibilities of the Consortium will be met. The Government does not assume the duty to search for data to cure problems it finds in proposals. The burden of proving acceptability remains with the Offerors. All information is to be submitted at no cost or obligation to the Government. All Offerors are urged to ensure that their initial proposals are submitted with the most favorable terms in order to reflect their best possible potential. The Government intends to evaluate offers and enter into an OTA without technical exchanges. However, the Government reserves the right to conduct technical exchanges if it is determined to be necessary. If the decision is made to hold technical exchanges, one or more proposal revisions may be required. After the conclusion of technical exchanges, the Government will give all Offerors an opportunity to submit final proposal revisions by a common cutoff date. Any final proposal revisions will be evaluated in the same manner and in accordance with the same criteria as originally solicited. The Government does not intend to provide feedback to unsuccessful Offerors, unless feedback is requested. Upon a timely request the Government will provide feedback to the Offeror. A request is considered timely when it is received by the Government within ten (10) business days of the Government's award notification. Each interested Consortium shall submit only one proposal. Offerors are responsible for adequately marking proprietary or competition sensitive information contained in their response. No sensitive or classified information shall be submitted. Foreign-owned, controlled, or influenced firms are advised that security restrictions may apply that may preclude their participation in these efforts. The Offeror's proposal shall be submitted in severable volumes based on the Factors as set forth in section 7.3 below and all information specific to each Factor shall be confined to that volume. Each proposal must include all volumes and shall be submitted by the closing date and time of the solicitation. Failure to provide any volume may result in the proposal being given an Unacceptable rating. Information provided shall be specific to each Factor. The proposal shall be limited to three (3) Volumes as follows: - Volume 1: Consortium Membership and Expertise (Factor 1) - Volume 2: Consortium Structure and Management (Factor 2) - Volume 3: Cost/Price (Factor 3) Volumes 1 and 2, when combined, shall be limited to 60 pages (font size 11 or larger), single-spaced, single-sided, 21.6 x 27.9 cm (8.5 by 11 inches). Smaller type may be used in figures and tables, but must be clearly legible. Margins on all sides (top, bottom, left, and right) should be at least 2.5 cm (1 inch). Please submit all pages as a single (.doc or .pdf) file for each volume. Proprietary or competition sensitive information, if any, should be minimized and MUST BE CLEARLY MARKED. Please be advised that all submissions become Government property and will not be returned. The page limitation includes all information, except the following four (4) items: - Cover Pages - Membership List - Articles of Collaboration/By-Laws - Consortium Membership Agreement (CMA) (if applicable) The Cost/Price Volume has no page limit. The Cost/Price proposal and all supporting schedules (labor computations, bill of material, travel matrix, subcontract proposals, etc.) must be submitted in Microsoft Excel with all formulas intact and functioning, and not as Adobe PDF. All Excel formulas, lookup tables, and links shall be intact, and no links shall exist to files not included in the submission. Excel workbooks shall not contain hidden spreadsheets. PDF or any other types of flat files will not be considered adequate. Failure to comply with these requirements may result in rejection of your proposal. 7.2 Cover Pages A cover page shall be included for each Volume. A cover page shall include the name of the Consortium, the name of a corporate point of contact (POC), the name of a technical POC, a telephone number for each POC, the full mailing address of the Consortium, e-mail addresses for each POC, and any other pertinent information. 7.3 Content The proposal shall include the following: 7.3.1 Factor 1: Consortium Membership and Expertise (a) Narrative describing the Consortium's collective expertise and ability to support all of the Technology Objectives discussed in Section 2.1 and Technology Areas discussed in Section 2.2. Include any charts or tables that help identify the Members that have expertise or experience in the different Technology Areas. (b) Narrative describing the number and status of the current Consortium Members, which includes the proportion that are traditional versus nontraditional defense contractors, and Members of industry versus Members of academia. Include the current Consortium Membership List (inclusive of CAGE Code numbers and business status). (c) Narrative describing the extent to which the Consortium maximizes the ease of entry for qualified entities to become Members and actively compete for technology projects. (d) Narrative describing the Consortium's demonstrated current capability, as well as future plans for Member retention and growth. (e) Narrative describing the Consortium's demonstrated capability to promote the active participation and engagement of its Members. 7.3.2 Factor 2: Consortium Structure and Management (a) Narrative describing the Consortium's organizational structure, mission, vision, strategic objectives and performance metrics. (b) Narrative describing the Consortium's management structure, which includes interaction/oversight desired with its Members, and the proposed interaction/relationship desired with the Government. (c) Narrative describing how the necessary management functions will be performed. These functions include, but are not limited to, coordinating and hosting Industry Days and Collaboration Days, preparing and submitting Quarterly and Annual reports, performing outreach to the membership, fostering teaming among membership, providing logistical and information support to membe...