GSA aims large task order to small businesses

General Services Administration Administrator Lurita Doan and other officials met today to make final changes to an upcoming request for proposals to streamline the agency’s information technology infrastructure.

“It is the intention of GSA to move toward a standard, enterprisewide resource management framework in the next year,” a request for information states.

The agency issued the RFI to determine if its 8(a) Streamlined Technology Acquisition Resources for Services governmentwide acquisition contract could handle the task order.

Historically, GSA’s Office of the Chief Information Officer managed the agency’s wide-area network and e-mail system. The Federal Technology Service, Federal Supply Service and Public Buildings Service oversaw their own IT services and support, according to the RFI.

A centrally managed IT infrastructure would make GSA’s operations more efficient. The agency is interested in transforming the dynamics of the existing organization, such as its structure, contract management and functional alignment, the RFI states.

The agency estimated the general cost to be as high as $500 million over five years.

Many 8(a) business owners say they lack the resources to handle a job that big and that officials did not balance the size and scope of the task order to the capacity of the businesses.

“Rather than looking at it as something that is too big, the minority business community needs to say, ‘Our time has come,’” Doan said. She called the proposal an enormous opportunity to be the procurement’s prime contractor.