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Federal Market Intelligence for Small Business |
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CIO-SP4 amendments coming fast & making vendors furiousThe National Institutes of Health’s recent “CIO-SP4” solicitation and its series of amendments have had a very discouraging effect on vendors. Some are asking NIH to pause the acquisition and push back the deadline for submissions by at least 30 days. Anticipation had built up for months over the 10-year, $50 billion procurement for health IT services and solutions. Industry interest has been high and potential offerers have invested significant resources in preparing for submissions, which are now due on Aug. 3. But the Request for Proposals released in May and its amendments have thrown a wrench into the expectations. Nine protests have been filed with the Government Accountability Office. Some contractors are at the brink of giving up. Stephanie S. Kostro, executive vice president for policy for the Professional Services Council, a trade group for government services contractors, wrote to NIH officials on July 22 saying that vendor investments in applying for CIO-SP4 are now at risk. At the time of Kostro’s letter to NIH, there were 7 amendments to the RFP. An 8th amendment was released on July 23. “The PSC emphasized to (NIH) in August 2020 that the final RFP should contain no surprises, especially regarding allowable teaming relationships,” Kostro wrote in the letter to NIH. “Unfortunately, the final RFP released on May 25 contained new and, at times, inconsistent requirements. The 7 amendments published since late May have served to further compound industry concerns and have forced potential offerors to consider alternative strategies or decide not to bid on the CIO-SP4 opportunity at all.” The PSC is not alone in its criticisms. Attorneys from PilieroMazza PLLC sounded alarms about Amendments 3 and 7. “As is easy to see, the new CIO-SP4 RFP unduly restricts competition and violates federal law. Unfortunately, because (NIH) is looking to exclude as many small businesses as possible from the competition and – it seems – limit competition generally, companies will be forced to protest the solicitation or lose their ability to compete for one of the most important RFPs to be released in recent history,” the PilieroMazza attorneys wrote about the third Amendment. Amendment 7 also raised significant concerns: “Amendment 7 may be the most serious change to the RFP since it was initially released in final form,” the PilieroMazza lawyers wrote. Christopher Coleman, of Koprince Law LLC, blogged about several concerns with Amendments 7 and 8. Kostro, along with the PilieroMazza attorneys and Coleman, among others, say there is likely not enough time for vendors to amend their applications to comply with all the new conditions in the amendments. Some companies reportedly are considering abandoning their plans to bid. As a result of the problems, the PSC’s Kostro spelled out several recommendations to NIH in her letter:
NIH officials were not immediately available.
More information:
PSC letter: https://bit.ly/3i6V9MK
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Washington Insider:
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