Molina Engineering, Ltd./Tri-J Industries, Inc. Joint Venture, B-284895, May 22, 2000

B-284895 May 22, 2000 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Exclusion of protester's proposal from competitive range is unobjectionable where agency reasonably concluded that. The proposal was not among the most highly rated. Determination that protester's price was unrealistically low was reasonable. 2. Agency's evaluation of protester's experience for risk rating purposes properly took into consideration the fact that protester had not performed contracts that were similar in size and scope to the contract contemplated by the solicitation. Molina contends that the Army improperly concluded that its price was unrealistically low and unreasonably evaluated its proposal with respect to past performance. The solicitation was limited to qualifying section 8(a) firms. /1/ RFP Secs. View Decision Matter of: Molina Engineering, Ltd./Tri-J Industries, Inc. Joint Venture File: B-284895 Date: May 22, 2000 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Molina Engineering, Ltd./Tri-J Industries, Inc. Joint Venture protests the exclusion of its proposal from the competitive range under request for proposals (RFP) No. DAPC50-00-R-0001, issued by the Department of the Army to obtain maintenance services and minor construction for family military housing at the Aliamanu Military Reservation, Hawaii. Molina contends that the Army improperly concluded that its price was unrealistically low and unreasonably evaluated its proposal with respect to past performance. We deny the protest. The types of services needed to maintain the 2,585 housing units at Aliamanu correspond with the three contract line items (CLIN) set forth in the solicitation: service calls and other recurring work; change-of-occupancy housing maintenance; and other indefinite-quantity work. RFP Sec. B. The solicitation contemplated the award of a fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (ID/IQ) contract, with a 1-year base period and up to four 1-year option periods. RFP Secs. C.1, F.1, F.3, L.4. The solicitation was limited to qualifying section 8(a) firms. /1/ RFP Secs. I.10, L.9. The Army intended to award the contract to the offeror whose proposal represented the best value. RFP Secs. L.3.f.1, 4. Offers were to be evaluated under the following factors: experience and past performance; technical; oral presentations; and price. RFP Secs. M.2, M.3. The experience and past performance factor was equal in importance to the technical factor and oral presentation factor when combined. RFP Sec. M.3. Price was not scored, but its importance was considered approximately equal to all non-price factors when combined. Id. The solicitation contemplated conducting price realism analyses of the price proposals. RFP Secs. L.12.B.3.d, M.4.d.1. The initial evaluation was to be based on the offerors' experience and past performance, technical, and price proposals. After evaluating these proposals, the Army planned to establish a competitive range. The contracting officer intended to limit the number of proposals in the competitive range to the number that would permit an efficient competition among the most highly rated proposals. RFP Sec. L.12.B.1.b., L.3.f.4. Oral presentations would be made by only the offerors within the competitive range. RFP Sec. M.2. The Army received 12 proposals in response to the solicitation. The source selection evaluation team used color/risk ratings to evaluate proposals under the experience and past performance factor and color ratings to evaluate under the technical factor, /2/ and also conducted price realism analyses. The contracting officer completed the final evaluation and made his competitive range determination the next day. He found that the five most highly rated proposals formed a natural cluster in pricing and categorized them as the "Group 2" proposals. Competitive Range Determination (CRD) Para. 5. The offers of Molina and another firm--the "Group 1" proposals--received lower ratings and proposed substantially lower prices than did the Group 2 offerors. The offers of the remaining firms--the "Group 3" proposals--received lower ratings and proposed substantially higher prices than did the Group 2 firms. Id. For reasons discussed below, the contracting officer determined that Molina's proposed price was unrealistically low. In addition, the firm's technical rating was yellow/acceptable, and its experience and past performance rating was yellow/moderate risk, based on a green/low risk rating for past performance and an amber/high risk rating for experience. The amber rating resulted from the Army's finding that both joint venture firms lacked significant experience in contracts of this type and/or magnitude. The contracting officer believed that this limited experience might be a contributing factor to the firm's unrealistically low price. CRD Para.