JIEO services deal is a boon for small businesses

The Defense Information Systems Agency's Joint Interoperability and Engineering Organization Systems Engineering program is a showcase for small businesses with skills ranging from satellite communications to logistics systems.

DISA in January awarded the $610 million multiple-award pact to seven small businesses and one large business Logicon Inc.'s Logicon Eagle Technology Inc. unit.

The small-business winners are ARTEL Inc. Reston Va. Femme Comp Inc. Sterling Va. J.G. Van Dyke & Associates Inc. Alexandria Va. Pragmatics Inc. McLean Va. SETA Corp. McLean Stanley Associates Alexandria and Validity Corp. Encinitas Calif. For a number of the contractors the deal could potentially be the largest piece of federal business ever [FCW Feb. 3]. But this does not necessarily mean they are unfamiliar with big contracts.

For Validity JIEO represents the latest in a series of prime contract wins which include two prime contracts on the Transportation Department's Information Technology Omnibus Procurement.

Phil Bower director of business development at Validity said the Defense Message System could be one potential area of activity on the JIEO contract noting that the company already runs DMS certification labs for DISA and the Army.

Stanley Associates also counts ITOP among its prime contracts. Chris Hunady director of business development said the company specializes in data engineering applications development in fields such as logistics and network design.

JIEO could be the largest job ever for Pragmatics an 8(a) firm. But the company also is involved with the National Institutes of Health's Chief Information Officer Solutions and Partners program as a subcontractor to I-NET Inc. a unit of Wang Laboratories Inc. Pragmatics specializes in telecommunications and systems engineering and is currently in hiring mode on the JIEO contract.

SETA an 8(a) company last year captured one of several prime contracts on NIH's ImageWorld program. The company offers systems engineering business process re-engineering and communication systems analysis design and integration.

And ARTEL an 8(a) firm has supported such Defense Department proj-ects as DMS and the Defense Information Systems Network.

The company's services include telecommunications and systems engineering said Abbas Yazdani president of ARTEL.

Femme Comp a woman-owned business has supported satellite communications projects at DISA for the past 16 years said company president Maureen Wilcox.

The JIEO pact specifically calls for satcom skills but the company plans to support all task areas under the contract. Femme Comp's subcontractors are CygnaCom Solutions Dynamics Research Corp. International Action Inc. and Performance Engineering Corp.

DISA's Defense Enterprise Integration Services II is among J.G. Van Dyke's large-contract opportunities. The company is a subcontractor to BDM International Inc. on DEIS II. Those roles are inverted on the JIEO pact in which BDM is a sub to J.G. Van Dyke.

"We intend to go out and market [the contract] and see what we can bring in " said Gerry Hice vice president of advanced programs at J.G. Van Dyke.