B-297176, Raloid Corporation, November 10, 2005

B-297176 Nov 10, 2005 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Raloid Corporation protests the award of a contract to DE Technologies, Inc. (DET) under request for proposals (RFP) No. N68335-05-R-0046, issued by the Department of the Navy for aircraft adapters. The protester primarily objects to the agency's evaluation of the Raloid and DET proposals. We deny the protest. View Decision B-297176, Raloid Corporation, November 10, 2005 Decision Matter of: Raloid Corporation File: B-297176 Date: November 10, 2005 Anthony Jadra for the protester. George C. H. Chou for DE Technologies, Inc., an intervenor. Timothy Lasko, Esq., Department of the Navy, for the agency. Linda C. Glass, Esq., and Michael R. Golden, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Protest is denied where the record shows that the agency's evaluation was reasonable and consistent with the solicitation's evaluation factors. 2. Where proposal, on its face, does not reasonably lead the agency to conclude that the offeror will not comply with the subcontracting limitation contained in the solicitation, the offeror's compliance concerns a matter of responsibility or contract administration not for review by the Government Accountability Office. DECISION Raloid Corporation protests the award of a contract to DE Technologies, Inc. (DET) under request for proposals (RFP) No. N68335-05-R-0046, issued by the Department of the Navy for aircraft adapters. The protester primarily objects to the agency's evaluation of the Raloid and DET proposals. We deny the protest. The solicitation was issued on February 1, 2005 for one pre-production ADU-876/E aircraft adapter unit and 450 production units.[1] The solicitation also contained four 1-year option periods for 450 units per option year, for a total of 2,250 production units manufactured in accordance with a government-furnished drawing package. The RFP provided that award would be made on a –best value— basis. The RFP listed the following evaluation factors and subfactors: (1) technical ((a) technical approach, consisting of manufacturing, assembly, and welding; production evaluation, testing, and quality assurance; and production plan, and (b) management, consisting of manufacturing capacity, facilities, and personnel resources; management approach; quality assurance program; and extent of small business and small disadvantaged business participation); (2) past performance (quality of product and processes; timeliness of performance; business professionalism and business relations; and customer satisfaction; (3) experience (similarity of product and similarity of environment); and (4) price. RFP para. M.27. Under the RFP, the technical evaluation factor was more important than the past performance and experience evaluation factors and the past performance and experience evaluation factors were equal in importance. The evaluation subfactors under the technical and past performance evaluation factors were listed in descending order of importance and the experience subfactors were identified as equal in importance. Offerors were further advised that price was significantly less important than the non-price evaluation factors combined, but the degree of importance of price would increase with the degree of equality of the proposals. The agency received 18 proposals by the closing date. As relevant here, as a result of the agency's evaluation, two proposals, including DET's, were rated highly satisfactory and low risk under the technical evaluation factor and the proposals of both of these offerors received a low risk rating under the past performance and experience evaluation factors. Agency Report (AR), Tab 2, Source Selection Evaluation Board (SSEB) Evaluation Summary. DET, whose proposal was rated highly satisfactory overall, proposed the lowest total price of all offerors. The cost evaluation team determined that DET's proposed price was reasonable. DET was requested to verify its price to ensure that its price proposal did not contain any mistakes; DET subsequently confirmed its price. AR, Tab 3, E-mail from DET to Agency. Raloid's proposal was rated satisfactory and low risk under the technical evaluation factor, and low risk for both the past performance and experience evaluation factors. AR, Tab 6, Business Clearance Memorandum, at 15. Raloid submitted the lowest price of the six proposals rated satisfactory overall. Id. at 20. Raloid's price was significantly higher than DET's. The source selection advisory counsel (SSAC) recommended to the source selection authority that DET be selected for award because its proposal represented the best value to the government based on DET having submitted one of the two highest rated proposals at the lowest overall evaluated price. AR, Tab 4, SSAC Source Selection Memorandum.