Report: Air Force Plans NETCENTS Set-Aside The Air Force plans a small business set-aside for IT networking services on its primary networking vehicle, the Network Centric Solutions (NETCENTS) contract, according to the market research firm Input. The draft RFP for NETCENTS 2 is due in December. The original NETCENTS contract, which expires in 2009, has a ceiling of $9 billion over five years. Eight companies won places on that contract, including four small firms. Input said the follow-on version will be split into three areas: services, products and services-small businesses. In addition to creating a separate track for small companies, Input said the new contract will permit product vendors to serve as primes; they are relegated to subcontracting on the current contract. Product sales have accounted for nearly 85% of spending under the current NETCENTS. A separate report by the Input Executive Program forecasts that solutions will be a more significant part of NETCENTS 2. “Only 10% of task order spending to-date has been spent on product and service solutions,” said the report’s author, Deniece Peterson. “We expect this to change with NETCENTS 2 because the Air Force is moving towards a more strategic and integrated IT approach.” “Because of this new structure, the competitive landscape has the potential to change significantly,” she added. Prime contractors on the current NETCENTS are Booz Allen Hamilton, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and four small businesses: CENTECH Group, Multimax, NCI and Telos.