Defense Intelligence Agency launches IT services contract
By
Bob Brewin
Procurement estimated to be worth $6.6 billion over five years.
The Defense Intelligence Agency kicked off a procurement on Wednesday estimated to be worth $6.6 billion for information technology services for the intelligence community worldwide as well as other Defense Department and federal agencies.
Barbara Austin, manager of research and analysis services at INPUT, a Reston, Va., market research firm, said the Solutions for the Information Technology Enterprise contract is one of the top federal information technology acquisitions of the year. It has attracted interest from more than 1,000 vendors who use INPUT's services.
DIA has put the five-year SITE procurement on a tight schedule, with bids due July 16. The agency plans to make eight awards, four to large businesses and four to small companies.
The SITE procurement will serve as a follow-on to two intelligence community contracts, the Department of Defense Intelligence Information Systems and Engineering Support Services Contract (DIESCON3), and the Air Force's Intelligence Information, Command and Control, Equipment and Enhancements (ICE2).
The Air Force had planned to run its own follow-on to the $1.95 billion ICE2 contract awarded to General Dynamics in 2003, but in May 2008 announced DIA would run the procurement.
BAE Systems, Booz Allen Hamilton, CSC, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, SRA International and L-3 Communications all have awards under the Defense Intelligence Information Systems and Engineering Support Services Contract and Austin said she expects these companies, along with ICE2 contract holder General Dynamics, to bid on the SITE procurement.
DIA said it planned to award task orders to winning bidders of the SITE contract for services that run the gamut from systems design to development and maintenance of enterprise storage systems to operations of Top Secret voice, video and data networks.
DIA said it intends to make contract awards on a "best value" basis and warned that it will not consider bids that are "unrealistically low" in price.
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