OCR Services, Inc., B-290946, October 21, 2002

B-290946 Oct 21, 2002 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights DIGEST Protest challenging agency's evaluation of protester's technical proposal and selection of awardee's higher-rated proposal for award is denied. These publications are available to subscribers in hard-copy and electronically on-line from a comprehensive on-line environmental health information service maintained by NIEHS. The agency anticipates that "the revenue generated from orders for the subscriptions to the EHP journals and other NIEHS documents will offset the cost of the Information Services Project." /1/ Agency Report. The contractor will be responsible for "preparing and printing the materials. Offerors were informed that. The following technical evaluation factors and their respective weights were identified in the solicitation: 1. View Decision OCR Services, Inc., B-290946, October 21, 2002 * REDACTED DECISION DIGEST Attorneys DECISION OCR Services, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Brogan & Partners Convergence Marketing under request for proposals (RFP) No. 273-02-P-0004, issued by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), for services supporting the NIEHS Health Information Services Project. OCR, the incumbent contractor, challenges the agency's technical evaluation and source selection decision. We deny the protest. NIEHS and the National Toxicology Program (NTP) publish a number of documents, including the Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP) journal, the Reports on Carcinogens, and the NTP's Technical Report Series (consisting of toxicology, carcinogenesis, and toxicity reports). RFP Statement of Work (SOW) at 1. These publications are available to subscribers in hard-copy and electronically on-line from a comprehensive on-line environmental health information service maintained by NIEHS. The agency anticipates that "the revenue generated from orders for the subscriptions to the EHP journals and other NIEHS documents will offset the cost of the Information Services Project." /1/ Agency Report, Tab 3, Negotiation Memorandum (June 25, 2002), at 4. The RFP, issued as a total small business set-aside on March 26, 2002, provided for the award of a contract for services supporting the NIEHS Health Information Services Project for a base year with four 1-year options. The contractor will be responsible for "preparing and printing the materials, preparing and maintaining the Internet versions . . . , marketing the environmental health information service, and managing the collection of subscription fees and records." RFP SOW at 2. The contractor would also be responsible "for proposing (subject to Government approval) fees (subscription rates, advertisement rates, reprint charges, etc.) suitable for the development and continuation of a commercially successful Environmental Health Perspectives On-line." Id. at 4. Offerors were informed that, in addition to the fixed price, offerors would receive a base fee of 6 percent of the fixed price for contract tasks; in addition, the RFP offered firms the opportunity to request additional incentive fees for exceeding specified revenue levels. RFP Sec. B. The RFP provided that the basis for award would be a cost/technical tradeoff and that "paramount consideration shall be given to the evaluation of technical proposals rather than price." RFP Sec. M.3.b. The following technical evaluation factors and their respective weights were identified in the solicitation: 1. Technical experience, technical qualifications, and past performance (30 points) 2. Technical approach and methodology (20 points) 3. Marketing (20 points) 4. Understanding stated objectives (20 points) 5. Fiscal solvency (10 points) NIEHS received 3 proposals, including OCR's and Brogan's. /2/ Proposals were evaluated by the agency's technical evaluation committee, and only OCR's and Brogan's proposals were included in the competitive range. Discussions were conducted with each firm. Revised proposals were received and evaluated, as follows: . Brogan OCR Technical Score (100 max. pts.) 93 64 Price/Cost $18,125,905 $17,388,645 Brogan's superior technical score reflected the evaluators' judgment that Brogan had presented a proposal with many evaluated strengths and few weaknesses. Among the proposal strengths underlying Brogan's superior technical score was that the evaluators found that Brogan had offered an executive staff with impressive credentials in priority setting and goal satisfaction and had proposed employing OCR's current on-site support staff that, the evaluators found, had "demonstrated the ability to handle contract needs in an exceptional manner." Also noted by the evaluators was that Brogan had multiple government and non-government contracts demonstrating Brogan's performance skills and that Brogan had an impressive record of success in producing printed public health publications.