GSA extends comment period for Alliant

Midsize businesses interested in the Alliant governmentwide acquisition contract now under development have until March 31 to provide comments about it to the General Services Administration.

GSA officials published a request for information in February, with a deadline of today, asking for comments on how to define midsize businesses and how to make Alliant a vehicle they can compete on.

An amendment to that RFI, published yesterday, extends the deadline to the end of the month. It also clarifies the definitions of "business model" and "functional area" to aid contractors that may not be familiar with the terms.

A business model, the amendment states, is simply a company's strategy for generating revenue, typically including management, marketing, human resources and financial aspects of that strategy.

A functional area in a contract is a related set of tasks and skills. Although contracts can often have multiple functional areas under one umbrella, the current plan for Alliant is for it to have only one functional area. One question GSA wants midsize business feedback on is whether such firms believe they can realistically compete under that structure.