SOURCES SOUGHT
18 -- PTSS Industry Satellites Request for Information (RFI) - PTSS Information Library - PTSS Industry Satellite RFI
- Notice Date
- 11/15/2012
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- NAICS
- 336414
— Guided Missile and Space Vehicle Manufacturing
- Contracting Office
- Missile Defense Agency, (MDA), (DACS), Building 5222, Martin Road, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, 35898-0001, United States
- ZIP Code
- 35898-0001
- Solicitation Number
- MDA-PT-2012-0014
- Archive Date
- 1/1/2013
- Point of Contact
- Elizabeth Sciortino, Phone: 7038826168, Valarie Hall, Phone: 2564501448
- E-Mail Address
-
elizabeth.sciortino.ctr@mda.mil, valarie.hall@mda.mil
(elizabeth.sciortino.ctr@mda.mil, valarie.hall@mda.mil)
- Small Business Set-Aside
- N/A
- Description
- FOUO Handling Instructions RFI 1. Description. This announcement is to conduct market research on industry's ability to manufacture, integrate, model, test and deliver additional agile PTSS satellites beyond those being developed by the current laboratory development team. This announcement also seeks industry's feedback on the acquisition strategy for a future request for proposal (RFP) to build these additional satellites. The intended outcomes of this market research are to determine industry and small business capabilities and the extent to which commercial items or non-developmental items could be used to build the PTSS industry satellites, and to use responses to develop acquisition strategy alternatives. The Government does not intend to award a contract based on this request for information (RFI). Any response will be treated as information only and not a proposal. Responses will be separated from, and have no bearing on, proposals submitted to any future formal RFP. Eligibility to participate in a future acquisition does not depend upon your response to this notice. The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) will not evaluate the responses to this notice. The MDA does not intend to pay for the information solicited and will not reimburse any costs associated with responding to this RFI. The MDA does not seek or want proprietary information. If you submit such information, you must clearly mark "proprietary" on every sheet containing such information and segregate the proprietary information to the maximum extent practical from other portions of your response (for example, use an attachment or exhibit). Respondents are responsible for adequately marking proprietary information in their response. The Government intends to use non-Government (contractor) support personnel as subject matter experts to help the program office review the responses, including review of any marked or unmarked proprietary information. The non-Government (contractor) support personnel have executed non-disclosure agreements with the Government. Those agreements are on file with the Government. If you respond to this RFI, it would constitute your acknowledgement and agreement that the information you provided, including any marked or unmarked proprietary information, may be disclosed to these non-Government (contractor) support personnel. 2. Background. The MDA is chartered to develop a Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS), integrating land, sea, air, and space assets to defend the United States, its friends and allies, and deployed forces from ballistic missile attack. In FY 2011, the MDA began the PTSS program as a new space sensor for the BMDS. The objective of the program is to deliver an operational space-based missile tracking system to address the post-boost challenge; to provide engagement quality, fire-control quality tracks to networked shooters; to support object characterization and discrimination; and to be an agile, effective sensor against mobile and emerging threats. To meet this objective, MDA will acquire the PTSS in two phases: a laboratory development phase and an industry manufacturing and production phase. The two distinct phases will progress concurrently, with planned award of the industry manufacturing phase's contract occurring before the PTSS critical design review. For the laboratory development phase, the Johns Hopkins University/Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU/APL), a University Affiliated Research Center (UARC), leads a laboratory team to design, integrate and launch two satellites in FY 2017. The other laboratory members on this UARC, Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDC), and military service team include Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Lincoln Laboratory, the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, Utah State University Space Dynamics Laboratory, and Sandia National Laboratories. The Government will receive a technical data package for the development program with technical data, algorithms, and software with Government purpose rights. Additionally, the Government will ensure all PTSS data remains Government purpose rights and/or unlimited rights for the duration of the entire PTSS program. The Government intends to buy more satellites in the manufacturing and production phase in two steps. In Step 1, before laboratory critical design review, the Government plans to competitively award two industry manufacturing and production contracts for industry to work with the laboratory development team using Government acquired data rights and the laboratory developed technical data package. In Step 2, after laboratory critical design review, the Government will conduct a limited competition between the two Step 1 industry teams to manufacture, test, and deliver their satellites. The industry satellite competition is planned so that the Government will favor proposals minimizing changes to the laboratory developed system design, limiting changes to those that improve manufacturing, producibility and affordability. We anticipate that during constellation fielding and satellite replenishment follow-on, satellite procurements will be lot buys acquired as either priced options to the industry manufacturing and production satellite contract and/or as separate competitive procurements. The laboratory development phase will set the performance baseline for the industry manufacturing and production phase. While the size of the operational constellation has not been established by the warfighter, this RFI seeks interested industry participants able to build approximately ten initial satellites. 3. PTSS Laboratory Satellite Overview. PTSS satellites are agile vehicles supporting two payloads: a sensor payload and a communications payload. The sensor payload is body-fixed with focal plane arrays in three colors: two infrared colors and a single visible/near infrared color. The communications payload will have crosslinking capability with each of its neighbor satellites in the on-orbit constellation and an uplink/downlinking capability with dedicated PTSS ground station(s). PTSS satellites will operate in low Earth orbit and observe ballistic missile trajectories above the Earth's limb. 4. Submission Instructions. The MDA requests interested parties submit responses that cover the following items: 1. What are your capabilities or products to perform the scope identified in this RFI? 2. Can commercial and/or non-developmental items satisfy the need in this RFI? 3. What are your customary practices for warranties, discounts and contract type? 4. What are the distribution and support capabilities of potential suppliers? 5. What legal or regulatory requirements are unique to this acquisition? 6. What functions, typically found in the ground segment to control and operate the industry satellites, could be advantageously partitioned to be in the space segment? (Note: for this question, the space segment is defined to be the constellation of satellites and the ground segment is the terrestrial antenna station(s), mission and constellation software and data networking equipment.) 7. What type and level of software capability/certifications should be required to assure that industry software development processes fully support and are synchronized with satellite system hardware development and manufacturing activities? (For example, capability maturity model integration (CMMI) levels.) 8. Recommend anticipated percentages for small business subcontractor participation for industry satellites. Include the proposed North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code and the type of small business contractor you expect to use. 9. Indicate whether you would join in the industry satellite acquisition with other firms/entities as team member or joint venture. Include your company size and status. 10. Recommend incentives/ratios and pricing arrangements for the industry satellite acquisition. Include incentives that minimize changes to the satellite design, lower production cost, and so forth. Include supporting rationale with your recommendations. 11. In terms of submitting a proposal for a best value source selection, what content do you recommend the Government should request for critical evaluation for the industry satellites based on a technical data package containing proceeds from the laboratory preliminary design review? Include supporting rationale with your recommendations. 12. In terms of evaluating a company that submits a proposal, what evaluation criteria differentiates companies' capabilities (for example, data rights, software engineering, and manufacturing processes) if a best value source selection is conducted for the industry satellites based on a technical data package containing proceeds from the laboratory preliminary design review? Include supporting rationale with your recommendations. 13. What data items do you recommend be included in the technical data package provided at the time of the industry satellite RFP (assumed to be between the preliminary and critical design reviews of the laboratory program)? Assign a priority to each item based on the following scale: high = essential / required information; medium = valuable supporting information; low = non-essential useful information. 14. What is your experience with concurrency? Do you see problems in working with a non-organic design? How would you mitigate risk when working with the laboratory team in a concurrent environment? 15. Recommend how to minimize nonrecurring engineering costs in the transition from the laboratory development to the industry production phase. Responses are limited to a maximum of 15 pages, excluding the cover page. The cover page must show: 1) company name and address; 2) primary point of contact and one alternate; 3) telephone number and e-mail address; 4) Dun & Bradstreet, or "D-U-N-S," number; 5) Commercial And Government Entity (CAGE) code; 6) NAICS code; 7) small business category and size standard, if applicable; and 8) facility clearance, and to what level. To assist with these RFI questions, this announcement includes a "PTSS Information Library" package. The library contains PTSS background and program information. Interested companies must register at the Federal Business Opportunities (FBO) website at https://www.fbo.gov/ and be added to the authorized parties list under this announcement to receive access to the library. If added on the authorized parties list, the company will receive email notification that access has been granted to the package. Contractors are not authorized to further disseminate documents marked "For Official Use Only" in this library. Submit your response in electronic format to Valarie Hall, PTSS contracting officer, at ptss@mda.mil, no later than 30 calendar days after the original posting of this request. Submit questions that help interested sources clarify information in this RFI in electronic format and send them to the email address above. All questions must be received no later than 15 calendar days after the original posting of this request. The Government will try to answer as many questions as possible, but may defer some to Industry Day. In all cases, the Government will provide answers publicly. The MDA will not acknowledge receipt of responses to this RFI. The MDA will not accept classified information. 5. Industry Day. The MDA may conduct an Industry Day and possibly have one-on-one discussions after reviewing responses to this RFI. If you respond, we encourage you (including small and small disadvantaged businesses) to attend and discuss this RFI with us. Details of the Industry Day will be in a forthcoming announcement on the Federal Business Opportunities website (www.fbo.gov).
- Web Link
-
FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/spg/ODA/MDA/MDA-DACS/MDA-PT-2012-0014/listing.html)
- Record
- SN02931871-W 20121117/121115235150-60830b6e0dbebff9b2dc05a7fa7c796e (fbodaily.com)
- Source
-
FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)
| FSG Index | This Issue's Index | Today's FBO Daily Index Page |