Bevilacqua Research Corporation, B-293051, January 12, 2004

B-293051 Jan 12, 2004 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights DIGEST Protest is denied where the agency's evaluation of the protester's proposal was reasonable and consistent with the terms of the solicitation. Where the solicitation provided that the technical evaluation factors were significantly more important than price. Oracle applications and Primavera P3e and Primavision applications) that will be modified as necessary to accommodate the Corps's newly standardized business process and to interface with the Corps's financial management and other legacy systems. The P2 system will be the Corps's sole project management business process automated information system and will support 20. The contract will be performed at the Corps's Huntsville Engineering and Support Center in Huntsville. View Decision Bevilacqua Research Corporation, B-293051, January 12, 2004 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Bevilacqua Research Corporation (BRC) protests the award of a contract to Future Research Corporation (FRC) under request for proposals (RFP) No. DACA87-03-R-0008, issued by the Army Corps of Engineers for implementation of its next generation project management information system, known as the "P2 system." BRC, which submitted a significantly lower priced proposal, protests the evaluation of its proposal and the agency's decision to award to FRC, an offeror submitting a higher technically rated, higher priced proposal. We deny the protest /1/ BACKGROUND The RFP, issued on March 14, 2003, described the P2 system as a group of commercial, off-the-shelf software application products (specifically, Oracle applications and Primavera P3e and Primavision applications) that will be modified as necessary to accommodate the Corps's newly standardized business process and to interface with the Corps's financial management and other legacy systems; the P2 system will be the Corps's sole project management business process automated information system and will support 20,000 users in the agency's core mission areas (i.e., military programs, civil works, and environmental projects). Under the terms of the RFP, the contract will be performed at the Corps's Huntsville Engineering and Support Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The RFP contemplated the award of an indefinite-delivery/ indefinite-quantity contract (fixed-price and time-and-materials) for the base period and four 1-year option periods. /2/ As relevant here, at the end of the pricing schedule and in clause 4.0, captioned "Minimum Ordering Obligation," the RFP included the estimated monetary value for each period of contract performance and the total estimated contract value, i.e., the government estimate, which was $11,258,750. (In the administrative report, the agency explains that the government estimate was calculated in large part using the most current (2001) Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) national occupational employment and wage estimates for labor categories that basically corresponded to the labor categories in the RFP. The BLS estimates reflected non-loaded, hourly rates paid to employees, to which the agency added amounts corresponding to general and administrative expenses, overhead, and fringe benefits; the agency also added a 3-percent inflation factor to the BLS estimates for each year past 2001. Contracting Officer's Statement, Nov. 7, 2003, at 21-22.) The RFP also included labor category descriptions that listed desired education/general experience qualifications for the particular labor category position. For example, the RFP's labor category description for the program manager position stated as follows: Desired Education/General Experience: Should have a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Business or related field. Should have a minimum of 12 years in software/system development/implementation or software/system maintenance. Functional Responsibility: Provides day-to-day management of overall contract support operations, possibly involving multiple projects and groups of personnel at multiple locations. Organizes, directs and coordinates planning and production of all contract support activities. Demonstrates writing and oral communications skills. Establishes and alters (as necessary) corporate management structure to direct effective contract support activities. Negotiates and makes binding decisions for the company. RFP Sec. C, Labor Category Descriptions. The RFP provided that the award would be made to the offeror whose proposal was determined to represent the best value to the government, considering technical evaluation factors and price. The RFP stated that the technical evaluation factors were significantly more important than price.