NASA Infrastructure Improvement Program (I3P) KSC Acquisition Request for Information

Synopsis – Oct 02, 2008

General Information

Solicitation Number: N/A
Reference Number: RFI-NEDC-1
Posted Date: Oct 02, 2008
FedBizOpps Posted Date: Oct 02, 2008
Original Response Date: Oct 14, 2008
Current Response Date: Oct 14, 2008
Classification Code: D — Information technology services, incl. telecom services
NAICS Code: 518210 – Data Processing, Hosting, and Related Services

Contracting Office Address

NASA/John F. Kennedy Space Center, Procurement, Kennedy Space Center, FL 32899

Description

John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC) NASA Enterprise Data Center (NEDC) Acquisition related to the NASA Information Technology (IT) Infrastructure Improvement Program (I3P) REQUEST FOR INFORMATION

THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL, QUOTATION, OR INVITATION TO BID NOTICE

This RFI is for information and planning purposes and is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government nor will the Government pay for information solicited. Respondents will not receive feedback on the information obtained through this RFI process.

No solicitation exists; therefore, do not request a copy of the solicitation. Prior to the release of any solicitation for this effort, a pre-award synopsis will be posted on the Government-wide point of entry at URL http://www.fedbizopps.gov .

A. Background

In conjunction with the Agency Chief Information Officer’s (CIO) NASA Information Technology (IT) Infrastructure Improvement Program (I3P) as outlined at the NASA Industry Briefing conducted on July 23, 2008 at the Ronald Reagan International Building in Washington, D.C. (http://i3p-acq.ksc.nasa.gov/i3p/default.cfm ) the KSC is currently in the acquisition strategy development phase for NASA Enterprise Data Center (NEDC). NASA data center services are currently provided under numerous contracts across the Agency which includes approximately 15,000 servers in 78 data centers which support approximately 80,000 desktops/laptops: serving approximately 18,000 NASA Civil servants and 44,000 contractor personnel, 4500 applications, and 8000 websites.

The current state of NASA data centers include:

• Three Agency Enterprise Data Centers: NASA Data Center (NDC) at MSFC, NASA Web portal managed by GRC, and Scientific and Technical Information (STI) managed by LaRC
• 75 other known data centers across NASA
• Estimated 15,000 servers Specific issues include:
• Applications range from small to very large enterprise systems.
• Physical facility issues related to new technology implementation (power and cooling)
• Large recurring capital investment
• Varying and duplicative Enterprise services and service levels
• Under-utilized server and storage capabilities
• Simplification of Continuity of Operations Planning (COOP) and IT Disaster Recovery (DR) capabilities
• Server and storage sprawl
• Nonstandard policies, processes, and procedures across Enterprise
• NASA directive for IT consolidation includes a Data Center component supporting: – end user services – web services – communications – enterprise applications

The target NEDC shall provide data center services and resolve the present Agency-wide disparate data center implementation. NASA is exploring all approaches for data center consolidation services ranging from:

• * Housing, where a Data Center Vendor provides offsite facility space, power, HVAC, equipment racks, physical security, network and includes provisions for COOP and DR. NASA provides hardware (servers and storage devices), to maximize existing investments; NASA defines server and storage architecture.
• * Hosting, which includes Housing capabilities listed above plus application hosting, system administration, IT security, data storage, services monitoring/management, and mainframe services.
• * Combination Integrated Approach, where a Data Center Vendor provides services to operate NASA’s onsite distributed data center infrastructure and implement best practices to consolidate. The vendor shall transition and operate an integrated enterprise data center environment. This approach could maximize use of offsite housing and hosting services to lower cost and provide efficient data center operation to ensure high service availability and provide for COOP and DR. In addition this approach shall include methods for introducing the rapid integration of hardware to assist in the transition from legacy infrastructure to a consolidated and centralized architecture. The objective for NEDC is to provide an Agency-wide data center hosting and housing capability, with secure physical and logical access, compliant with Federal requirements, achieving 99.7% (minimum Tier II+) to Tier III (99.9%) and level of availability including COOP / DR implementation. The NEDC scope could potentially include, but is not limited to, the following:
• * Consolidate services into a single set of Agency data centers with a goal of maximum use of outsourced commodity-type data center services for housing and hosting * As necessary, maintain a local data element of the NEDC at each NASA center to meet center specific performance needs * Management of the above components by a single service provider
• The following preliminary acquisition schedule is provided below. It is subject to revision as requirements evolve: Responses to this RFI are due October 14, 2008 by 12:00 noon EST. We plan to conduct Industry One-on-One Meetings October 15 – 16, 2008. Tentatively we are planning a Draft RFP release in December 2008, a final RFP release in February 2009, with Contract award in September 2009. To request a one-on-one meeting email the request to the point of contact identified below.

NASA has implemented an I3P acquisition portal which can be accessed at the following location: http://i3p-acq.ksc.nasa.gov

NASA/KSC plans to implement a NEDC Acquisition Portal to provide information related to this acquisition for which KSC will have primary responsibility. This site can be accessed via the I3P portal referenced above, when operational. The purpose of the site will be to provide supplemental information of use to industry. However, interested parties should continue to monitor both the NASA Acquisition Internet Service (NAIS) and FedBizOps as the official sites for information/notices to industry regarding the acquisitions.

B. INFORMATION REQUESTED

NASA invites industry to submit feedback on the stated scope, schedule, technical requirements, and procurement approach October 14, 2008 by 12:00 noon EST. The feedback should be no more than 25 pages in length. Each 25-page submission shall include responses to questions listed in the following paragraphs. The response format is 8.5″ x 11″, 12 pt, Times New Roman font.

NASA is seeking capabilities from large businesses, as well as from small, small disadvantaged, 8(a), HUBZone, women-owned small businesses, veteran-owned, service-disabled veteran-owned, and/or Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) for the purposes of determining the appropriate level of competition. In addition to the 25-page submission, responses shall also include the following (limited to three (3) pages or less, formatted as above): name and address of firm, size of business, average annual revenue for past three (3) years and number of employees, ownership, business category as described above; number of years in business; affiliate information: parent company, joint venture partners, potential teaming partners, prime contractor (if potential sub) or subcontractors (if potential prime); and point of contact – position, address and phone number. Please comment on the appropriateness of the above identified NAICS code.

RFI responses should be directed as follows, marked as NEDC: NASA/John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC), Procurement Office, Attn: Jeff Lamke, Code OP, KSC, FL 32899. Phone: (321) 867-9342 Email- jeffrey.c.lamke@nasa.gov

For purposes of the NEDC RFI, please provide four hard copies of your response, plus two electronic (CD) copies. Interested firms should provide answers/comments to any or all of the following general questions and acquisition specific questions delineated below within the 25 page limitation. Answers which demonstrate clear benefit to performance, schedule and/or cost are of particular value and interest to the Government. The Government is requesting responses to the following:

1. Provide a list of similar contracts of comparable scope, magnitude, and complexity to these acquisitions that NASA should consider in developing the procurement strategy and solicitation. Identify the contract number, brief description of scope, contract type, customer, approximate value and number of personnel, Government/Customer Contracting Officer and technical points of contact with telephone numbers and E-mail addresses. Please expand to include any complexity issues you have encountered.

2. Provide comments relating to typical Industry acquisition schedule and the length of time needed to perform a procurement of this magnitude, including the length of time and information necessary to conduct due diligence and assemble a comprehensive and accurate proposal for the work to be accomplished.

3. NASA anticipates implementation of Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) V.3 compliant processes to manage the consolidated I3P effort. Describe how your business has applied the ITIL process to similar efforts, the advantages and disadvantages, as well as any lessons learned.

4. With regard to housing and hosting services, comment on the merits or disadvantages of using government furnished property (e.g., servers, storage devices) versus vendor provided property. Describe potential approaches whereby industry prices the range of services contemplated in a “commodity” fashion (i.e., fixed unit pricing).

5. Given the anticipated requirement scope, the Government is very interested in industry comments and recommendations for the most effective contract structure(s)/type, scope(s), and contract term. Provide a recommended contract structure(s), scope of contract(s), and term for the anticipated scope. Describe the reasoning behind your recommendations and provide the following: a. Describe the types of information that the Government would need to provide potential offerors in order for them to accurately price such a contact type. b. Based on your response to the above: i) describe objective standards that could be used to measure contractor performance, ii). describe potential methods to incentives innovations and cost savings throughout the life of the contract, iii) describe a set of service delivery components that could be banded and priced in such a way to allow for incremental acquisition of these services as additional in scope work is identified. Further, describe both risks and mitigations the Government should consider in its development of a procurement strategy and solicitation. Provide any related lessons learned from your previous contracts that support your responses to the above.

6. As the technology and approach for providing the described services evolve, opportunities arise for increased efficiency and effectiveness. Recommend a contract fee/profit incentive approach that would lead the successful contractor to strive for these efficiency improvements. Consider contract type in this recommendation and discussion. 7. Describe your recommendations for integration of services between I3P acquisitions (Data Center, Web Services, End User Services, Communications, etc), as well as integration, migration and consolidation of operations at the many existing NASA Data Centers. NASA is anticipating replacing the current contract financial reporting and service delivery management systems utilized on current contracts. These systems provide cost reporting/forecasting, planned vs. actual cost reporting, cost analysis, Purchase Request (PR) tracking, Full Time Equivalent (FTE) analysis, etc. Describe the type of system your business has used on similar efforts that could be used to successfully manage the effort.

8. Describe your company’s experiences (e.g. lessons learned) with similar types of consolidation efforts and your recommendations for transition of existing NASA data center services to the new contract. Also describe what support would be needed from the Government to affect a successful transition.

9. What is the standard commercial data center best practice for transferring hosted services (applications and data) from a legacy data center hardware platform to an outsourced provider hardware platform? Does the new data center service provider transfer hosted applications and associated data and validate in new environment; does the existing data owner move the data and validate in new environment; is there a sharing of transfer responsibility? What are the issues and lessons learned on each of the above transfer scenarios? In addition, what are the industry best practices to accomplish this type of transition?

10. What is the industry experience with moving existing data center hardware to a new location in each of the two scenarios: a) equipment is provided by the customer (GFE), b) equipment is owned by the service provider (CFE). Also what are the pros and cons of customer provided property being mandated for use in a data center service model? 11. Address any innovative approaches industry has implemented to effect low risk approaches to moving data center hardware to a new geographical location. Include examples of non-traditional concept of operations that might help us meet our goals, such as, data center “PODS” or “Data Center in a Shipping Container”. Information is requested to assist NASA in developing potential solutions for change management of “as is” environments to “to be” environments.

12. Describe potential opportunities for corporate investment and how industry would recoup this investment; including innovative approaches where other statutory authorities may be available, such as, use or lease of Government owned real property. 13. NASA is still defining the specific scope to be delivered in each of the I3P acquisitions. This acquisition may include “Center Unique” services such as consolidation and/or operation of Center specific data centers, transfer of data from existing hardware, software and data to any new data center hardware, including responsibility for ensuring operability of transferred assets and data. Please provide your company’s opinion on the services/scope that should be provided by NEDC as well as the efficiencies and impact.

14. Describe your mainframe services costing model and security features.

The Government will use the information provided to develop a comprehensive procurement strategy and solicitation. Any information used will be on a non-attribution basis. Restrictions that would limit the Government’s ability to use the information for these purposes are of limited value to the Government and are discouraged. If proprietary information is provided all such data shall be appropriately marked on each page.

Point of Contact

Name: Jeff C Lamke
Title: Contracting Officer
Phone: 321-867-9342
Fax: 321-867-8599
Email: jeffrey.c.lamke@nasa.gov