Imagine One Technology & Management, Ltd.

B-412860.3 Dec 09, 2016 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Imagine One Technology & Management Ltd., of Colonial Beach, Virginia, a woman-owned small business, requests that our Office recommend it be reimbursed the reasonable costs of filing and pursuing a protest of the award of a contract to Precise Systems, Inc., of Lexington Park, Maryland, under request for proposals (RFP) No. N00024-15-R-3217, issued by the Department of the Navy, Naval Air Systems Command, for project management support services. We dismissed the protest as academic based on the agency's corrective action. Imagine One argues that the Navy failed to take prompt corrective action in response to a clearly meritorious protest. We deny the request. We deny the request. View Decision 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:  Imagine One Technology & Management, Ltd.--Costs File:  B-412860.3 Date:  December 9, 2016 Alex D. Tomaszczuk, Esq., Alexander B. Ginsberg, Esq., and Meghan D. Doherty, Esq., Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP, for the protester. Caroline H. Cobb, Esq., Department of the Navy, for the agency. Charmaine A. Stevenson, Esq., and Laura Eyester, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST Request for reimbursement of protest costs is denied where the agency did not unduly delay taking corrective action in response to supplemental protest grounds and where the remaining protest grounds were not clearly meritorious. DECISION Imagine One Technology & Management Ltd., of Colonial Beach, Virginia, a woman-owned small business, requests that our Office recommend it be reimbursed the reasonable costs of filing and pursuing a protest of the award of a contract to Precise Systems, Inc., of Lexington Park, Maryland, under request for proposals (RFP) No. N00024-15-R-3217, issued by the Department of the Navy, Naval Air Systems Command, for project management support services.  We dismissed the protest as academic based on the agency’s corrective action.  Imagine One argues that the Navy failed to take prompt corrective action in response to a clearly meritorious protest. We deny the request. BACKGROUND The Navy issued the RFP on July 7, 2015, to holders of the Navy’s SeaPort-e multiple award contract, Zone 2, as a small business set-aside.  Agency Report (AR) at 1; RFP at 2.  The RFP contemplated a best-value award of a task order based on the following three evaluation factors:  (1) technical, (2) past performance, and (3) cost/price.  RFP at 105.[1]  The technical factor included two subfactors, in descending order of importance:  understanding and approach; and staffing and personnel.  Id. at 105-106.  The RFP stated that the technical factor is more important than past performance, and when combined, technical and past performance are significantly more important than cost/price.  Id. at 105. The Navy received three proposals in response to the requirement, and announced the award of the contract to Precise on February 23, 2016.  AR at 7-8.  Imagine One was provided a written debriefing on March 10.  AR, Tab 17, Debriefing.  On March 15, Imagine One filed its initial protest.  Imagine One’s initial protest argued that the Navy misevaluated Imagine One’s proposal under each of the technical subfactors, misevaluated the awardee’s proposal under the technical and past performance factors, performed an irrational cost realism analysis, and as a result, performed a flawed best-value tradeoff analysis.  Protest at 9-16.  In its agency report, the Navy argued that the evaluation and source selection decision were reasonable.  AR at 9-35.  In its comments on the agency report, Imagine One continued to challenge the reasonableness of the evaluation and selection decision.  In addition, the comments contained supplemental protest grounds that raised new challenges to the evaluation of Precise’s key personnel.  Specifically, Imagine One argued that the agency failed to assign weaknesses where it alleged certain of Precise’s key personnel failed to demonstrate that they satisfied the minimum experience requirements set forth in the RFP, and applied an unstated evaluation criterion when giving Precise undue credit for having so many personnel with top secret clearances when the RFP required only a secret clearance.  Comments at 13-16.  In addition, Imagine One alleged that Precise’s proposal on its face demonstrated an over-reliance on Precise’s subcontractor such that it is not small under the ostensible subcontractor rule, and requested that our Office recommend that the agency refer the matter to the Small Business Administration for a size determination.  Id.