Global Business and Legal Services, B-290381.2, December 26, 2002

B-290381.2 Dec 26, 2002 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights DIGEST Protest challenging evaluation of protester's proposal is denied where record shows that agency evaluated proposal in accordance with the solicitation criteria. That its conclusions were reasonable. The legal services required are specific to the work performed by the Rural Utilities Service. The technical proposal also was to "include a brief overview of the partner and associate level staffing depth for each of the applicable practice areas listed in Section C.". Award was to be made to the responsible offeror whose technically acceptable proposal offered the best value to the government based on the following evaluation factors (and subfactors): technical (relevant experience. The three evaluation factors were equal in importance. View Decision Global Business and Legal Services, B-290381.2, December 26, 2002 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Global Business and Legal Services protests the rejection of its proposal under request for proposals (RFP) No. RP-31ME-2-0001, issued by the Rural Development Agency, Department of Agriculture, for legal services. Global argues that the agency improperly evaluated its proposal. We deny the protest. The RFP, issued February 22, 2002, contemplated the award of multiple indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts for nationwide legal services for a base year, with 4 option years. The legal services required are specific to the work performed by the Rural Utilities Service. The RFP required that the contractor, "as a minimum, maintain legal expertise in the following practice areas: corporate, tax, bankruptcy, project finance, real estate, and energy law applicable to electric utilities," and stated that "[a]dditional expertise in laws applicable to cooperatives, environmental law and secured transactions may be required." RFP Sec. C.3.1. Section L of the RFP required that proposals include key personnel and corporate resumes, and that the key personnel resumes indicate, among other things, education, background, recent (within the past 5 years) experience, and specific professional or technical accomplishments. Under the heading "Relevant Experience," the RFP required that technical proposals include evidence that the offeror has "extensive experience of being involved at least one third of the time over the past three (3) years in the following practice areas: 1) corporate, 2) project finance, 3) lease transactions, and 4) applicable tax law." RFP Sec. L.8(B)(1). The technical proposal also was to "include a brief overview of the partner and associate level staffing depth for each of the applicable practice areas listed in Section C." Id. Award was to be made to the responsible offeror whose technically acceptable proposal offered the best value to the government based on the following evaluation factors (and subfactors): technical (relevant experience, staffing, subcontracting), past performance, and price. The three evaluation factors were equal in importance, and the first two technical subfactors were more important than the third. The RFP noted that award may be made to other than the lowest cost proposal based on superior technical features, predominately focusing "on the amount of 'extensive experience' held by key personnel and corporate technical expertise." RFP Sec. M.1(d). Twelve proposals, including Global's, were received by the March 25 closing time. A four-member technical evaluation panel (TEP) evaluated the proposals by assigning them an adjectival rating of exceptional, acceptable, marginal, or unacceptable under each factor and subfactor. Eight of the proposals were rated technically acceptable; four, including Global's (ranked tenth technically) were rated technically unacceptable. Global's unacceptable technical rating was based on its unacceptable rating under the staffing and relevant experience technical subfactors; it was rated exceptional for past performance, and received a high performance risk rating. Regarding relevant experience, the TEP found that Global's proposal demonstrated no significant utility or energy transactional experience, no rural electric cooperative utility experience or energy financing experience, and no depth in the required fields of bankruptcy, tax, environment, project finance, or energy law, as applied to electric utilities. As for staffing, the TEP's evaluation noted that Global's proposal is "really about one limited person rather than a broad based law firm" and that the person's experience "is extremely limited in the energy or utility transactions." /1/ Agency Report (AR), Tab G, TEP's Final Memorandum, at 5. The TEP recommended award to the eight offerors with acceptable technical rankings, and the contracting officer, following the TEP's recommendation, awarded contracts to these eight companies.