Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), Contracts Management Office (CMO), 3701 North Fairfax Drive, Arlington, VA 22203-1714

A -- ELECTRONIC COMMERCE RESOURCE CENTERS (ECRC) SMALL AND MEDIUM- SIZED ENTERPRISE ELECTRONIC COMMERCE PILOT PROGRAMS (SME EC PILOTS) SOL BAA95-23 DUE 042095 POC LTC Doyle Weishar, Technical POC, Electronic Mail: BAA95-23@arpa.mil. The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) is soliciting proposals in the area of demonstrations of electronic commerce applications for small- and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises (SME).Proposed research should investigate innovative approaches to overcoming technical and business barriers and thereby enabling revolutionary advances, research which simply evolves the existing state of practice will be considered only if it supports the overall revolutionary change. A total of approximately $5 million is available for funding multiple efforts selected from this BAA. Size of awards and duration of efforts will vary according to the type of effort undertaken (see below). Teaming with centers established under the Electronic Commerce Resources Center (ECRC) Program is encouraged and will be favorably evaluated, but not required. For the purposes of this BAA, ''EC'' is the inter-organization exchange of business and technical data by electronic means, and the use of electronic data to drive business processes and design and manufacturing operations. In advanced stages, EC will support companies in making outsourcing decisions, in distributed collaborative engineering and in real-time distributed collaboration in virtual enterprise environments. Improved business practices are required to implement advances in EC. Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are manufacturing enterprises with fewer than 500 employees, which are part of the integrated defense/commercial industrial base. PROGRAM OBJECTIVES AND DESCRIPTION. The ECRC Program mission is to deploy information technologies and tools required to meet the needs of DoD suppliers and SMEs in EC. Proposals selected under this program are intended to develop and validate innovative business practices and enabling technologies for an EC continuum that increases the capability of suppliers to use electronic data to improve internal processes and reduce cost and cycle time. Proposals should combine technologies and business practices in electronic data interchange (EDI), technical data interchange (TDI) to (1) promote increases in the extent of use of electronic commerce within an industry, particularly among the small- and medium-sized enterprises, or (2) systematically improve the extent of integration of EDI and TDI into business practices and manufacturing operations, or (3) address the needs of small- and medium-size enterprises in teaming with other companies in response to business opportunities, or in collaborating on the design and manufacture of products with other companies. Selected proposals will address problems that SMEs encounter in teaming with other businesses in response to defense relevant business opportunities or in collaborating with other companies, will document the lack of cost-effective solutions, will propose a solution, e.g., use of combinations of hardware, applications, software services and tools and commercial services, and will demonstrate that solution in a real business setting. The cost of the solution is a critical factor to SMEs. Software to be demonstrated may include those supporting distributed collaborative engineering, and the secure sharing of product design data. Services may include those that support outsourcing decisions, team formation, and rapid access to resources needed on a temporary basis. If a proposal includes development of new technology, then a commercialization plan must be included. Nominal scope of each award is $.5M - $1.5M over 12-18 months. It is anticipated that up to 5 awards will be made. Bidding teams are strongly encouraged to include as participants one or more of the ECRC's. The locations and points of contact for each Center are as follows: (Format: ECRC LOCATION, Program Manager, Telephone, Electronic Mail) FAIRFAX, VA, Bill Young, 703-691-1507, byoung@ecrc.gmu.edu; CLEVELAND, OH, Kent Kemmerer, 216-987-3212, kent.kemmerer@camp.org; DAYTON, OH, Joe Homan, 513-449-6073, jhoman@dayecrc3.sinclair.edu; JOHNSTOWN, PA, Barry Lerner, 814-269-2456, lerner@ctc.com; SCRANTON, PA, Mason Linn, 717-941-4123, linnm1@lion.uofs.edu; ORANGE, TX, Paula DeWitte, 409-882-3950, paula.dewitte@ecrc.kbsi.com; PALESTINE, TX, Mike LaBeau, 800-209-2772, mlabeau@ptxecrc.com; SAN ANTONIO, TX, Butch McGehee, 210-732-1141, butch@saecrc.org; OAKLAND, CA, Michael Shaw, 510-531-1777, shaw@ctc.com; ATLANTA, GA, Robert Fulton, 404-894-7409, fulton@me.gatech.edu; BREMERTON, WA, Ed Wilson, 360-478-0333, wilson@ctc.com. The bidding teams must also include one or more SMEs. GENERAL INFORMATION - OBTAINING PROPOSER INFORMATION. Internet email is the preferred mode of communication. Numerous commercial services are now available to provide prospective offerors with access to Internet. An automated-response email address (baa-info@arpa.mil) has been established at ARPA to provide rapid electronic access to information on this solicitation. To obtain the Proposer Information Package send an email message whose message field contains the single word ''help'', and the ''HELP'' file will be returned which contains a list of the files available, along with instructions on how to retrieve them. Full proposals must be submitted to the administrative mailing address below on or before 4:00 P.M., April 20, 1995. Proposers must obtain a document, BAA95-23 Proposer Information Package, which provides further information on areas of interest, the submission, evaluation, and funding processes, and proposal formats, and other general information. This document may be obtained by electronic mail as discussed above. Requests by US. mail to the administrative mailing address below will be honored, but with a slower response. Proposals not meeting the format described in the document may not be reviewed. This notice, in conjunction with the document BAA95-23 Proposer Information Package, constitutes the total BAA. No additional information is available, nor will a formal RFP or other solicitation regarding this announcement be issued. Requests for same will be disregarded. The Government reserves the right to select for award all, some, or none of the proposals received. This BAA will remain open for 12 months. Proposals received on or before April 20, 1995 will be considered for initial contract awards. Proposals received subsequent to April 20, 1995 will be considered for funding at later dates. Contract awards will be contingent on funding availability. All responsible sources capable of satisfying the Government's needs may submit a proposal which shall be considered by ARPA. Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and Minority Institutions (MI) are encouraged to submit proposals and join others in submitting proposals, however, no portion of this BAA will be set aside for HBCU and MI participation due to the impracticality of reserving discrete or severable areas of this research. Evaluation of proposals will be accomplished through a scientific review of each proposal using the following criteria, which are listed in descending order of relative importance: (1) Demonstrated technical merit and level of innovation of the proposed concepts and development program, (2) Magnitude and pervasiveness of the impact of successful development on the targeted electronic commerce application, industry sector, and the general integrated manufacturing base, (3) Plans and capability to quantitatively assess the merits of the electronic commerce technology and business practices developed, (4) Credibility and thoroughness of program plans for project execution, (5) Offeror's capabilities and related experience, including personnel, facilities, equipment, and data, and (6) Cost realism. Note: Cost realism will only be significant in proposals which have significantly under or over estimated the cost to complete their effort. All administrative correspondence and questions on this solicitation must be directed to one of the administrative addresses below, email is preferred. All questions and answers will be included (anonymously) in the FAQ file accessible to all potential program participants. ARPA intends to use electronic mail for correspondence regarding BAA95-23, however, proposals may NOT be submitted by fax or email, and any so sent will be disregarded. The administrative addresses for this BAA are: Fax: 703-522-6367 (Addressed to: ARPA/SSTO, BAA95-23), Electronic Mail: BAA95-23@arpa.mil; Mail: ARPA/SSTO Attn.: BAA95-23 4301 N. Fairfax Drive, Suite 725, Arlington, VA 22203. (0060)

Loren Data Corp. http://www.ld.com (SYN# 0002 19950302\A-0002.SOL)