Editor's Note: This article was originally published on Sept. 4, 2014.

DHS' Enterprise Acquisition Gateway for Leading Edge Solutions II (EAGLE II) contract vehicle is starting to come to life nearly four years after the government released the request for proposals, and close to two years after the first awards.

The contract, worth up to $22 billion in information technology purchases over seven years, has been delayed by bid protests but now is gathering momentum. As of late July, several DHS components have awarded task orders in all three functional categories worth $16.5 million in initial obligations under EAGLE II. I Those awards will amount to about $64 million if all option periods are exercised, said Dan Clever, deputy chief procurement officer.

The entire vehicle is still not up and running because DHS is in the final stages of the procurement process in two of the nine tracks—including the largest one—but the other seven competition areas are available for immediate use, Clever said.

"Things are changing," Clever said. "As more and more functional categories become available, we fully anticipate to see more workload going through EAGLE II."

Vendors bid to perform work under three functional categories:

FC1 — system and software design, development, engineering, implementation, integration, operation and maintenance to support the DHS mission and business functions across the entire lifecycle of a program,

FC2 — IT program support services such as business and technical management, enterprise architecture, training, business process reengineering and strategic planning to support DHS offices or programs, and

FC3 — Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V), testing and evaluation services to ensure all IT products and services meet DHS standards, and work to defined design, cost, schedule and performance specifications.

The second and third functional categories each have two competitive tracks, one unrestricted and one for small business. FC1 has five — unrestricted; all small business; Historically Underutilized Business Zone small business; service-disabled veteran-owned small business; and 8(a) small business.

The two tracks not yet open for business are FC1 unrestricted and FC1 8(a), Clever said.

"There have been protests and challenges, and we've been working our way through those," he said. "I think we've been doing very well in that regard, but it has taken time."

The Government Accountability Office, which adjudicates bid protests, had finished clearing its docket in June of all EAGLE II protests, dozens of cases. But GAO recently received a new complaint, filed July 29 by an 8(a) firm, which will extend delays through at least November. Previously, GAO dismissed about 30 protests without decisions on the merits because DHS decided to take corrective action, causing the number of awardees in the FC1 unrestricted category to grow from 15 in September to 68 in May.

In addition to EAGLE II business already awarded, components plan to award 20 more task orders or opportunities before the end of fiscal 2014, and three in fiscal 2015, according to a late-July search of DHS' Acquisition Planning Forecast System. The indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts have a five-year base ordering period, with one two-year option period. All EAGLE II task order competitions will consider the small business tracks first, before they are opened to the unrestricted track, Clever said.

"I definitely would characterize it as beginning to pick up," he said. "As soon as we clear the final obstacles, it'll pick up even more."

Waiting for EAGLE

Ron Gallihugh, the Transportation Security Administration's deputy assistant administrator for acquisition, said his agency has been getting along without EAGLE II by using other vehicles including Operational Application Support and Information Services II (OASIS II), a TSA blanket purchase agreement.

"They're all tools in a toolbox," Gallihugh said. "We have to work with our customers to define requirements and then we go and find the best tool to meet our needs. Our preference is to use the DHS vehicles. That's sort of the first stopping point. We put some mechanisms in place to ensure that those vehicles are used when they best meet our needs. If it's not the right vehicle, then we go find something else."

A benefit to adding EAGLE II to the toolkit will be knowing that its vendors were awarded contracts consistent with governance from DHS' Chief Information Officer, Gallihugh said. "They're already in the fence," he said, while some GWACs might be more generic.

The view from industry

Some vendors agreed they have seen a recent uptick in EAGLE II activity.

"We are certainly expecting a very busy rest of the summer and fall trying to respond to a lot of these RFPs," said Nancy Meiers, EAGLE II program manager for Capgemini Government Solutions, which has offices in Reston, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., and received an FC3 unrestricted award in June 2013. "DHS is one of our key accounts, so EAGLE II, category 3 is an important vehicle for us," added Barbara Rosenbaum, vice president for Capgemini's federal practice.

Despite the slow start, the company is optimistic about its prospects under EAGLE II. "Overall we feel good about the level of competition and the [amount of] work," Rosenbaum said. "I think there are huge opportunities here, and that the contracting vehicle will ultimately be successful," Meiers agreed.

Brian Baker, teaming coordinator for Ambit Group in Reston, Virginia, which received an FC2 small business award in May 2013, said the next six to 12 months will be key in determining whether EAGLE II succeeds.

"There weren't a ton of opportunities in the first year, but it seems to be increasing," said Baker, whose company has some EAGLE II bids pending before DHS. "With the FC1 protests now seemingly out of the way, we're hoping that the department and its components will see the program as open for business, and as a viable source of the services they need. We're optimistic going into fiscal year 2015 and beyond. The program's success hinges on how effectively they can get out of the gates."

Ambit secured a spot on EAGLE II despite not being on the first EAGLE, Baker said, partly because it has strong past performance across government, primarily as a prime contractor, even though it's a small business.

But some vendors say business is still slow, and that the department must ensure EAGLE II stands up well against other options, such as governmentwide acquisition contracts including CIO-SP3, NASA's Solutions for Enterprisewide Procurement (SEWP), and the General Services Administration's Alliant.

"We are hoping that more components of DHS use it," said Kim Nguyen, chief business development officer of Pragmatics in Reston, Virginia, which received an FC3 unrestricted award in June 2013. "I'm not really sure that they are. There hasn't been a lot of action."

Nguyen, whose company performs testing for U.S. Customs and Border Protection under EAGLE I, said he expected more use of EAGLE II by now because a government emphasis on cybersecurity and protecting critical infrastructure means funding has been available for those goals.

"I think what stands out here is that it's not being heavily used," Nguyen said. "I think that there's a lot of funding that's going on; it's just not going through this vehicle."

Pragmatics helps CBP with its technology that processes, in a typical day, 1 million passengers, 50,000 cargo containers and 270,000 privately owned vehicles through checkpoints, protecting borders, while still facilitating trade, Nguyen said. "Pragmatics tests the systems that enable these things. They enable systems such that when you swipe a passport, 99 percent of the people can go by, but certain people who have had issues in the past, who may be on terrorist watch lists or so forth, those people get removed for closer interviewing and scrutiny."

To attract components, EAGLE II must compare favorably to other vehicles in ease of use and processing speed, Nguyen and others said. "I'm hoping that the EAGLE program office also wants to be responsive to their customers and is competitive in these aspects too," Nguyen said. "I think that will help."

"Ease of use is not to be overlooked," Ambit's Baker agreed.

Mandatory use

Clever said DHS policy from August 2012 requires components to use DHS strategic sourcing vehicles, including EAGLE II, with certain exceptions, to more efficiently buy what they need because decentralized ordering and streamlined acquisition procedures save money and time. The policy was a "subtle change" over previous guidance that strategic sourcing was "mandatory for consideration," he said.

"EAGLE II is one of our most important strategic sourcing initiatives," Clever said. "The objective of EAGLE II is to help us establish contracts with experienced small and large businesses to help us provide the information technology and support services that meet our needs. That's the vision."

The "highly successful" first EAGLE contract "continues to provide us with a valuable procurement tool that leverages our buying power, and that's huge," he added.

When market research indicates components can obtain a lower price from another contract such as a GWAC, that constitutes an exception from DHS strategic sourcing vehicles. Other exceptions are for emergency operations, purchases that might compromise national security if done through strategic sourcing, purchases for remote locations, and when otherwise required by law or regulation. Customers also could request a waiver, which may or may not be granted, if none of the exceptions applied and they still wanted to go outside strategic sourcing.

"So we have built exceptions into the policy, but we're driving as much spending as we can to our strategic sourcing contracts," Clever said, because they give "us the ability to meet small business set-asides, and to access a wide variety of quality vendors."

"When you look at the awardees, we've got a cast of extremely well qualified vendors available and ready to go to help provide these services to DHS at extremely competitive prices, and that's what's pulling our customers to the vehicle as well," he said.

One major advantage EAGLE II has over outside contract vehicles is that components don't have to pay another agency a fee to use it, as they do with some GWACs, said Suzanne Petrie Liscouski, vice president for federal civilian agencies at NCI Information Systems. Virginia. The cost savings, as well as the ability to harness experience for future procurements, should drive components to EAGLE II, said Liscouski, whose company was one of the original 15 awardees in FC1 unrestricted last September.

"Keep in mind that EAGLE II is the premier vehicle for IT services," Liscouski said. "Out of all the strategic sourcing vehicles the department has, EAGLE is the go-to for IT."

Whether a component has to pay a fee to administer the procurement is only one consideration, said CGP's Waldron. "There's all kinds of factors that go into the decision of what contract they're going to use," Waldron said. Other variables include processing speed, the size and makeup of the competitor pool, and whether the vehicle fits the needs, he said.

EAGLE II's FC1 pool has more than 100 large and small vendors, while FC2 has 26 and FC3 has 14. DHS reviewed more than 600 proposals.

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