VAIVI RAN Testing Licenses

The U.S. Department of Commerce, through the Office of the Secretary and the Institute for Telecommunication Sciences in Boulder, Colorado, is pursuing a sole-source procurement for the purchase and renewal of specific Viavi TM500 software licenses to support ongoing research in Open Radio Access Network (RAN) systems within the CRAIN 5G Laboratory. The incumbent contractor, VIAVI SOLUTIONS INC, is the only authorized provider of these licenses, with no resellers permitted, and the government has determined that no other supplier can meet the technical requirements for testing with Nokia and JMA equipment or for video test cases requiring TeraVM RDA HTTP ABR Streaming functionality. The acquisition is being conducted under the authority of 10 U.S.C. § 3204(a)(1) and RFO 6.103-1, based on the justification that only one responsible source exists to fulfill the requirement. This procurement is not a formal solicitation, but a Notice of Intent to Sole Source, and while no formal Request for Quotation or Proposal is issued, responses from other potential vendors are being accepted for a 15-day period following the posting date of July 2, 2026, with a deadline for submissions on July 17, 2026. Interested parties must submit a single-page capability statement to the designated points of contact explaining how they can satisfy the technical specifications without disrupting current operations, refute the government’s sole source determination, and eliminate identified concerns. The contract will cover six specific software license items—TK5028, TK5056, TK5230, TK5068, TK5106, and TK3012—each enabling critical 5G New Radio testing capabilities including PDCP UL 256QAM, SRS, UE-specific CSI-RS configuration, scheduling entities per slot, uplink user equipment capacity, and HTTP ABR video streaming. These licenses are required for the continuous operation of the TM500 load tester in support of NTIA’s 5G research agenda. The contract is expected to be a one-year base award with no specified option periods, and delivery of the licenses must be made directly to NTIA.ITS’s facility at 325 Broadway, Boulder, Colorado, 80305, Building 1, Room 2226. Pricing and contract value are not disclosed, and no packaging, inspection, or administrative data are outlined