Managers looking to upgrade their offices' computer technology might choose to shop at the neighborhood Office Depot or from the offerings on another agency's contract. With that kind of competition, sales of information technology equipment, software and services under the General Services Administration's Schedule 70 declined 4 percent last year — from $16.4 billion in fiscal 2007 to $15.8 billion in fiscal 2008.

But that's not the whole story of IT sales at GSA.

Vendors and officials point to Alliant, GSA's new governmentwide contract for IT services, as well as other GSA schedules as opportunities to boost IT sales.

"Many things bought on other schedules are actually IT," said Ray Bjorklund, senior vice president and chief knowledge officer for FedSources Inc., a McLean, Va., market research firm. Photography and alarm systems, financial and business solutions — "there is still a lot of IT being purchased beyond Schedule 70."

Total sales increase

Although total IT sales are not going up as fast as other GSA sales, "total IT sales are growing if you count Schedule 70 and the others," Bjorklund said.

And Alliant, which updates and replaces previous governmentwide IT contracts, "will address many agency needs for the next 10 or 20 years," said P.J. Bulger, senior vice president of QinetiQ North America. "It is a total, comprehensive IT solution compared to other agency [contracts], which tend to be more focused."

QinetiQ North America, a prime IT contractor on numerous agency contract vehicles, reports great success with its position on GSA's Schedule 70.

"The overall dollar amount of our sales has slipped a bit, but our GSA sales continue to grow at about 12 percent annually, and most of that is in Schedule 70," Bulger said. "Moreover, we have done better on Schedule 70 than any other agency [indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract]."

General Dynamics IT also reports strong sales through GSA, and it contends that GSA's Alliant contract, upon which it is a contractor, will prove to be a boon.

"We expect a lot," said General Dynamics' Vic Bukowski, manager of governmentwide acquisition contracts. "Alliant is an easy contract to use. It covers all the contract types and is available to everyone. It will be good for us as we did a lot of business under ANSWER (one of the contracts Alliant replaces), and we believe those customers will now move over to Alliant."

However, others point to what they see as deficiencies that may continue to depress GSA sales.

Beau Bosley, program manager for Apptis Inc., a provider of IT solutions and services, said GSA could take a lesson from NASA's SEWP (Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement) contract, under which agencies across government can buy IT products and services.

The SEWP process is highly automated, Bosley said. A vendor can add a product to an existing contract in one day and get deletions or modifications in one day. "At GSA, if a customer needs a product that is not on the schedule, it could take two weeks to get it on."

At GSA, "some of the processes involved in uploading a contract and adding to it are fairly tedious," Bosley said. "Compared to SEWP, it's like night and day in terms of reporting fees or adding a product, in terms of the contract administration as a whole."

Terry Williams, chief information officer for the Eye Institute at the National Institutes of Health, agreed.

"For IT, we go where it is the cheapest and the quickest," Williams said. "GSA's offerings are fine and there is pretty much competition. But it takes time to get newer technology onto the schedules."

GSA sees room for optimism, said Tyree Varnado, deputy commissioner of GSA's Federal Acquisition Service.

"The Office of Integrated Technology Services portfolio sales have remained stable for the last few years as the organization focused its efforts on major new acquisitions such as Alliant, Alliant Small Business and Networx [telecommunications]," Varnado said. "We are confident this portfolio remains in a strong and viable business position."

To boost sales, GSA is trying to increase customer awareness of its technology offerings through the Web, agency forums and other outreach, Varnado said.

GSA also hopes for increased sales to state and local governments.

"Of the total $38 billion of all schedule sales, about $17 billion or $18 billion of that is IT sales and of that only about $400 million is at the state and local levels," said Jim Williams, GSA's commissioner of Federal Acquisition Service.

Expanding the schedules program

Sales opportunities would increase under a bill that would open the federal supply schedules program to state and local governments for purchases under the economic stimulus plan. The House passed the bill, introduced by Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., last month.

With additional sales from states and localities, GSA would be in a position to leverage its buying power "and get great savings," Varnado said.

GSA also has been making improvements to the program, such as by streamlining processes and improving service, said Larry Allen, president of the Coalition for Government Procurement, a trade advocacy group.

Over the past few years, some have criticized GSA for slowness in getting contracts in place and for making changes, additions or deletions to contracts. MeriTalk, described as a Facebook for federal IT workers, released a survey May 11 of 160 federal IT professionals in which some criticized Schedule 70 for taking too long to add products, having no centralized past performance data, and having no one to follow up with if there are problems with a purchase.

But even here, some improvements are being made, Allen said.

"GSA has started to implement new standard processes on contract modifications so contractors know better what is and is not required," Allen said.

Also helpful was the 2008 kickoff of GSA's Multiple Award Schedule Express Program, which aims to streamline and accelerate the process for vendors to obtain contracts, Allen said.

Jeff Chesko, Lockheed Martin's program manager for GSA vehicles, sees GSA "trying to make everything easier, for example, with e-Buy, which they are starting to use more now to issue requests for quotes. We are seeing a lot more opportunities there than we have seen in the past."

Lockheed Martin does more than $400 million a year in business on the schedules.

"We have been doing a lot of work under IT," Chesko said. "Next year, our sales should go up."

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