Everyone is talking about the GAO decision on CIO-SP4 and we wanted to share some of what we’ve heard that is salient for Polaris going forward.
If you need a quick refresher on the GAO decision for CIO-SP4, there is a good one here.
And a quick reminder that late last week the GSA said it was delaying the Polaris RFP until Jan. 2022 so that stakeholders could enjoy the holiday season.
Now that we are all caught up, let’s look at how CIO-SP4 could impact Polaris.
CIO-SP4 limited the amount of “goodness” a large business Mentor in a Mentor Protégé JV could contribute to the offer of that MP JV. Simply put, GAO said that was unfair to those MP JVs where the Mentor was a large business.
The Polaris Draft Solicitation currently contains a similar limitation on how much “goodness” a large business Mentor can contribute to their MP JV offer.
What are people saying about Polaris within this context?
We are consistently hearing:
- GSA should take the current decision into consideration and clean this up before they issue the final RFP. They should do this rather than put out a knowingly flawed solicitation and then amend it after they’ve felt the weight of industry hue and cry.
- GSA will need some time to fix the solicitation prior to issuing it and they should do so. They should delay briefly and then get it out when it is in proper shape.
The start-stop nature of CIO-SP4 when they were putting out their stream of Amendments caused us to Team, Un Team, and Re Team in various configurations. Based on the way the Self Scoring Points work in Polaris (i.e., with the NAICS codes being so important and the “have you worked together” being paramount), a series of Amendments that require revisions to Teaming and Teammates will just not work on Polaris.
It was a mess on CIO-SP4 but with Polaris, it will lead to a lot of offerors just not bidding.
GSA needs to take the time and get it right the first time.
Recent Comments