Americom Government Services, Inc., B-292242, August 1, 2003

B-292242 Aug 01, 2003 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Agency was not required to augment the proposal by considering information contained in competitors' proposals. Washington. /1/ Americom contends that one of the proposal alternatives that it offered easily could have been made fully compliant. Was improperly excluded from the competitive range on the basis of technical noncompliance. That: the contractor provide two satellites that are at least 4 degrees apart in orbit in order to mitigate the effects of sun outages and radio frequency interference. Satellites have sufficient signal strength to serve Seattle. The extended closing date for proposal submission was March 26. Were determined to be technically unacceptable for failure to comply with mandatory solicitation requirements and were eliminated from the competitive range because correction would require substantial revision and essentially the submission of new proposals. View Decision Americom Government Services, Inc., B-292242, August 1, 2003 * REDACTED DECISION DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Americom Government Services, Inc. protests the exclusion of its proposal from the competitive range under request for proposals (RFP) No. DCA500-03-R-0001, issued by the Defense Information Technology Contracting Organization (DITCO) for the acquisition of a space segment for the Alaskan National Airspace System Interfacility Communications System (ANICS), a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) backbone communications system consisting of satellite earth stations, transmission channels, and services for communications in Alaska and Seattle, Washington. /1/ Americom contends that one of the proposal alternatives that it offered easily could have been made fully compliant, and was improperly excluded from the competitive range on the basis of technical noncompliance. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND The RFP, issued on February 14, 2003, as a commercial acquisition under Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) part 12, sought fixed-priced proposals for a requirements contract for a base period of 2 years with 8 1-year options to supply the satellite space segment portion of the ANICS network. The RFP provided that award would be made to the responsible, technically acceptable offeror with an acceptable/neutral record of past performance whose proposal represented the lowest discounted life cycle cost to the government, with technical capability rated on a pass/fail basis. The solicitation included the clause at FAR Sec. 52.212-1(e) stating that the government intended to evaluate offers and award a contract without discussions. The solicitation specified a number of mandatory technical requirements, including, among others, that: the contractor provide two satellites that are at least 4 degrees apart in orbit in order to mitigate the effects of sun outages and radio frequency interference; satellites have sufficient signal strength to serve Seattle, Washington and all of the state of Alaska; all satellite transponders be non-preemptible; and the contractor provide satellite transponder space during the life of the contract, including a restoral plan for failure of any transponder that describes restoral for any outages that may occur. The RFP also required a satellite space segment plan which includes, for leased space segments for resale to the government, a detailed description of the lease plan between the contractor and satellite vendor. The RFP directed offerors to submit a technical response sufficiently detailed to evaluate compliance with the solicitation requirements, specifically including a satellite space segment plan and a restoral plan. The extended closing date for proposal submission was March 26, 2003. The agency received 19 proposals submitted by 12 offerors by the closing date, including Americom's proposal, which contained two alternatives. As a result of the initial evaluation, 14 proposals from seven offerors, including the two alternatives submitted by Americom, were determined to be technically unacceptable for failure to comply with mandatory solicitation requirements and were eliminated from the competitive range because correction would require substantial revision and essentially the submission of new proposals. AR at 5. /2/ A telephonic debriefing was provided to Americom on April 21. Thereafter, Americom filed this protest with our Office on April 29, alleging that one of its two proposal alternatives was improperly evaluated as technically unacceptable and unreasonably eliminated from the competitive range; in Americom's view the proposal could "easily" have been rendered technically compliant if the agency had considered relevant information in competitors' proposals for a similar solution, and had provided Americom an opportunity to cure other evaluated deficiencies through either communications or discussions.