Inte-Great Corporation

B-272780 Oct 28, 1996 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights The protester contends that it should have been permitted to make an oral presentation to demonstrate the technical acceptability of its proposed software package. Which was issued on April 5. Offerors were instructed that prior to the time set for receipt of initial proposals under the RFP. They should submit to the NRC "a matrix showing how each NRC mandatory requirement is satisfied in the proposed software." [2] Six offerors submitted proposals prior to the established closing time. Were determined to be technically unacceptable. Is all that the solicitation required. That it therefore should have been invited to make an oral presentation and to furnish a demonstration to validate its software's capabilities. View Decision Matter of: Inte-Great Corporation File: B-272780 Date: October 28, 1996 Agency properly declined to give protester the opportunity to make an oral presentation and to demonstrate its software where request for proposals (RFP) provided for such presentations/demonstrations only by offerors whose software complied with the RFP's mandatory requirements, and protester did not establish compliance with the mandatory requirements in its written proposal. Attorneys DECISION Inte-Great Corporation protests the rejection of its proposal as technically unacceptable under request for proposals (RFP) No. NRC-ADM-96- 157, issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for replacement of its automated property management system. The protester contends that it should have been permitted to make an oral presentation to demonstrate the technical acceptability of its proposed software package. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND The RFP, which was issued on April 5, 1996, sought offers to provide a commercial off-the-shelf software package, including customization of the software as necessary to meet the NRC's needs, and all necessary services and supplies to replace the NRC's existing property management system. The solicitation identified mandatory [1] and desirable requirements for the software, and informed offerors that those whose proposed software complied with the mandatory requirements would be given an opportunity to make oral technical presentations and to demonstrate their products to validate their performance. Offerors were instructed that prior to the time set for receipt of initial proposals under the RFP, they should submit to the NRC "a matrix showing how each NRC mandatory requirement is satisfied in the proposed software." [2] Six offerors submitted proposals prior to the established closing time. The technical evaluators concluded that two of the six proposals demonstrated compliance with the RFP's mandatory requirements and scheduled these two offerors for oral presentations. The remaining four proposals, including Inte-Great's, were determined to be technically unacceptable. By letter dated June 19, the NRC notified Inte-Great that its proposal had been eliminated from the competition since it had not demonstrated compliance with the RFP's mandatory requirements. DISCUSSION Inte-Great contends that its proposal "clearly indicated an affirmative response to all of the [RFP's] mandatory requirements"--which, according to the protester, is all that the solicitation required--and that it therefore should have been invited to make an oral presentation and to furnish a demonstration to validate its software's capabilities. We disagree with the protester's characterization of both the solicitation's requirements and its own response. As a preliminary matter, the protester's technical proposal did not clearly indicate an affirmative response to each of the RFP's mandatory requirements. On the contrary, the proposal simply did not address a number of the mandatory requirements regarding security; for example, it did not address the requirement that the software be capable of attributing each transaction to the individual initiating it or the requirement that it be capable of detecting and documenting all access and attempted access. Thus, even under the protester's interpretation of the RFP (i.e., that an affirmative response to each of the mandatory requirements was all that the RFP required), its proposal was unacceptable because it did not in fact furnish an affirmative response to each of those requirements. Further, the RFP did not require merely an affirmation that each mandatory requirement would be met; it required written documentation "showing how" each requirement would be met.