Description
On 15 September 2020, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) awarded a single, firm fixed price, follow-on contract to Recsolu, Inc. doing business as Yello. The award consists of a Base Year and three (3) Option Years, and has a total contract value of $4,208,750.00 (including all options). The Period of Performance for the Base Year is 15 September 2020 through 14 September 2021. Among other things, this Event Management Service contract will provide the Intelligence Community (IC) with the ability to use a centralized talent acquisition platform to deliver personalized candidate experiences to potential IC applicants and simplify the recruiter-on-campus experience. The automated event management service allows for execution of campus recruitment events on a single platform. The event management service automates the process of collecting information from potential candidates through tailored and scalable pre-registration messaging campaigns and on-site data collection critical to evaluating an event’s return on investment. All contractor services will be performed from an off-site, non-Government location. As previously stated in the Government’s Notice of Intent to Sole Source, an IC pilot contract was previously established with Yello for its Software as a Service (SaaS) that provides event management for employee recruitment and hiring. During the pilot contract, Yello’s SaaS was specially tailored to meet the IC’s event management needs and implemented by certain IC elements. The purpose of the follow-on contract is to provide the resulting highly specialized SaaS to the entire IC to meet an initiative from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to develop more robust processes for the IC to collaboratively recruit and hire. This action was conducted in accordance with FAR Part 6.302-1 “Only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.” This exception was applicable due to the fact that award to any other contractor would have likely resulted in unacceptable delays, as well as a duplication of cost that was not expected to be recovered through competition. Establishing an IC-wide contract for this capability has been an initiative that ODNI has been working towards for many years. The IC pilot contract with Yello was established to assess the potential benefit and feasibility of these services. Given the positive results and the benefits gained from the pilot contract and Yello’s specialization of its SaaS offering for the IC, the Government was ready to implement the final stage of its initiative where this capability was made available to the whole IC. Award to any other source for an event management SaaS would have likely resulted in duplication of costs and unacceptable delays. Yello had already been proven during the pilot contract. If a follow-on IC-Wide contract had not been awarded to Yello at this stage of the initiative, then the Government would have had to conduct a source selection and award another similar pilot contract before that SaaS could be made available to the entire IC. Going through the pilot process again would have been necessary for any new contractor as their services would have needed to be determined beneficial and feasible, and their SaaS offering customized, before making it available to the entire IC. This approach would have resulted in unacceptable delays considering the amount of time that would have been required to plan and conduct a source selection, and the period of performance of a new pilot itself. Such a competition and award of a new pilot contract would have cost the Government a lot of time and money just to get back to the same point it was already at. Also, the current pilot contract expires in September 2020, so an extension would have been necessary in order to prevent a break in service while the Government conducted a source selection. This approach would have also resulted in a duplication of cost. It would have cost the Government a duplication of costs for personnel salaries to plan and conduct the source selection; the cost associated with the new pilot itself; and the cost associated with the extension of the current pilot contract. Market research was conducted and it was unclear if any other contractors in this market can meet all of the Government’s requirements at the same level as Yello. However, given that Yello provides a SaaS that has been highly specialized for the IC during the pilot contract, award to a different source at this point would have likely resulted in duplication of costs and unacceptable delays. The Government will continue searching the marketplace for competitive alternatives. Following the conclusion of this follow-on effort, the Government will compete future requirements to the extent practicable. This notice does not constitute a request for proposals, quotations, or bids and does not commit NGA to contract for any supplies or services.