CBCA 7805

THIS OPINION WAS INITIALLY ISSUED UNDER PROTECTIVE ORDER AND IS BEING PUBLICLY RELEASED IN ITS ENTIRETY ON JULY 30, 2024 GRANTED IN PART: July 22, 2024 CBCA 7805 Y2FOX, INC., Appellant, v. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Respondent. Abass Y. Bamba, Managing Director of Y2Fox, Inc., Denver, CO, appearing for Appellant. Alexandra N. Wilson, Office of the Legal Adviser, Buildings and Acquisitions, Department of State, Washington, DC, counsel for Respondent. Before Board Judges BEARDSLEY (Chair), CHADWICK, and VOLK. VOLK, Board Judge. The United States Department of State (DOS) contracted with Y2Fox, Inc. (Y2Fox) to design, develop, and deploy an information system for the Colombian National Police in Bogota, Colombia. Finding Y2Fox’s work on the contract’s first deliverable unacceptable, DOS terminated the contract for cause. Y2Fox maintains that it satisfied the contract’s requirements. It challenges the termination for cause and seeks payment for contract line item number (CLIN) 001. The parties have submitted the case for a decision on the record without a hearing under Rule 19 (48 CFR 6101.19 (2023)). We find that Y2Fox failed to CBCA 7805 2 satisfy the contract’s requirements for the first deliverable and sustain the termination for cause. However, DOS accepted one portion of Y2Fox’s work on CLIN 001, and Y2Fox is entitled to payment of $12,142.10, plus interest, for that work. Background The Contract On September 30, 2021, DOS awarded a firm fixed price contract to Y2Fox for “[a]nalysis, development, testing, implementation and deployment” of an “Information System for the Selection of Human Resources,” known as “SISET,” for the Colombian National Police. Appeal File, Exhibit 10 at 84.1 The contract contained three CLINs. Exhibit 10 at 82-83. CLIN 001 covered system design. Id. at 82. For that CLIN, Y2Fox had to complete a set of requirements collectively identified as “Deliverable 12.1,” and Y2Fox had to obtain approval of that deliverable from representatives of both the United States Embassy in Bogota, Colombia, and the Colombian National Police. Id. at 100. The description for Deliverable 12.1 in the contract’s statement of work stated: SISET design: This deliverable shall include at least: - Architecture document (in Spanish) planned to develop the system. This must be presented at the beginning of the project and must include all the technological component[s] which will be implemented: application servers, database, database schemas, IP addressing, ports, connections with other data sources, balancing, WEBservice and other artifacts to be incorporated into the implementation. - Requirements gathering (analysis and validation of user requirements, needs assessment, risk identification). - Representation of architecture. - Database schema. - Detailed specification of the architecture components and their relationships. - Entity-relationship model - Logical view of the architecture. 1 All exhibits are found in the appeal file, unless otherwise noted. The page numbers cited are the Bates numbers on the exhibits. CBCA 7805 3 - Implementation view. - View of architecture processes. - Use cases and user stories with their respective prototypes for each of the functionalities, screens or forms of the system, in which all the actions of the system are reflected. - Detailed document of the final design of the system. - Monitoring and evaluation reports Id. at 100-01. The contract identified twenty-four modules that needed to be designed and developed as part of the system. Exhibit 10 at 85-95. The contract required Y2Fox to “carry out a preliminary work of verification, analysis and definition of requirements and functionalities . . . alongside the delegates of the National Police.” Id. at 95. Performance of the entire contract was to be completed within twelve months after the award. Exhibit 10 at 102. As awarded, the contract provided for completion of Deliverable 12.1 by November 30, 2021, id. at 82, although the period of performance for that deliverable was later extended to March 31, 2022.