Accurate Automation Corporation, B-292403; B-292403.2, September 10, 2003

Accurate Automation Corporation, B-292403; B-292403.2, September 10, 2003 TITLE: Accurate Automation Corporation, B-292403; B-292403.2, September 10, 2003 BNUMBER: B-292403; B-292403.2 DATE: September 10, 2003 ********************************************************************** Accurate Automation Corporation, B-292403; B-292403.2, September 10, 2003 DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This redacted version has been approved for public release. Decision Matter of: Accurate Automation Corporation File: B-292403; B-292403.2 Date: September 10, 2003 Tenley A. Carp, Esq., and Karen Yankosky, Esq., McGuireWoods, for the protester. Mark D. Colley, Esq., Christopher R. Yukins, Esq., Caitlin K. Cloonan, Esq., and Stuart Turner, Esq., Holland & Knight, for Raytheon Company, an intervenor. Barry L. Williams, Esq., Department of the Air Force, for the agency. Paul I. Lieberman, Esq., and Michael R. Golden, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Under unrestricted solicitation that called for full and open competition with no provision for award under small business innovation research (SBIR) program or for any other small business preference, there was no basis for agency to afford special assistance or differential treatment to small business offeror, notwithstanding offeror*s erroneous assertion in its proposal that it could be awarded an SBIR contract for the requirement. 2. Agency reasonably evaluated protester*s past performance as neutral under subcontractor management subfactor where protester lacked relevant subcontractor management experience; the proposed large business subcontractor*s past performance record in managing subcontractors cannot reasonably be credited to small business protester as the prime contractor, notwithstanding alleged mentor/protege agreement between the two, since the evaluation subfactor is intended to assess the prime contractor*s ability to supervise and control that mentor*s performance as a major subcontractor. 3. Agency reasonably determined that the significantly reduced technical and past performance risk offered by technically superior proposal warranted the payment of the associated evaluated cost premium under a solicitation for a cost reimbursement contract for a complex system development program which provided that the technical factors were significantly more important than cost. 4. Award determination, as well as underlying cost/technical tradeoff vis-`a-vis protester, is unobjectionable even though focused on comparison between awardee*s proposal and that of the next highest technically rated proposal where, notwithstanding protester*s low evaluated cost, record establishes propriety of evaluated technical superiority of awardee*s proposal, and the protester*s proposal was reasonably evaluated as a distant third. DECISION Accurate Automation Corporation protests the award of a cost reimbursement contract to Raytheon Company under request for proposals (RFP) No. F08635-03-R-0002, issued by the Department of the Air Force for the system development and demonstration (including low rate initial production (LRIP)) of the miniature air launched decoy (MALD). Accurate asserts that its proposal was evaluated improperly and that the agency*s determination to award to Raytheon is arbitrary and unreasonable. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND The solicitation was issued on January 14, 2003, with an amended February 25 closing date for receipt of initial proposals, on the basis of full and open competition with award to be made to the offeror whose proposal presented the *best value.* The RFP stated that non-cost factors combined were significantly more important than cost. The RFP set forth four evaluation factors, consisting of past performance and proposal risk, which were equal in importance, and each of which was of greater importance than the mission capability and *affordability* (cost) factors, which were also equal in importance to each other. The solicitation also reserved the agency*s right to give evaluation credit for proposed features better than stated desires or goals, and to award to other than lowest price offeror. RFP S: M-2(b). The agency received four proposals including ones from [deleted] plus those submitted by Accurate and Raytheon. After performing initial evaluations, the agency conducted discussions with all offerors during which each offeror was provided with its past performance evaluations for all of the programs that it had identified and any additional programs that the performance risk assessment group (PRAG) had identified.