You might remember the movie Top Gun from a few years back. There they were: Goose and Maverick sitting in their F-14 over the desert of Fallon, Nevada, looking for those pesky little airplanes who were their adversary in the training exercise.
Well, it isn’t Top Gun, and it isn’t the Navy, but the U.S. Air Force has a pre-solicitation on FedBizOps for CAF ADAIR (Solicitation Number: FA4890-17-R-0007). That’s Combat Air Forces (CAF) Contract Adversary Air (ADAIR) Services. The contract is envisioned to be a multiple-award task order contract with a lifespan of up to 10 years, with both on-ramps and off-ramps as the government deems fit. At least one contract award is set-aside for small business; other than that, it’s full and open competition.
Anticipated solicitation release is 1 December 2017, with a proposed deadline of 28 February 2018. Contract award is on or about January 2019.
Pre-proposal conference is tentatively scheduled for 14 December at Langley AFB, VA.
As the Performance Work Statement says “…The objective of the CAF ADAIR acquisition is to provide realistic advanced adversary air threats from commercial ADAIR sources to support pilot combat readiness training.” ADAIR services include, with the caveat not limited to: aircraft; aircraft systems support; pilots; aircraft maintenance; support equipment; program, quality and contract management.
There are the usual three volumes of technical, price, and subcontracting plan (large business only), but with a very big caveat. A technical volume will be submitted for each of the below task orders, and these task orders will be awarded at the time of IDIQ contract award.
- Langley AFB, VA Task Order
- Hickam AFB, HI Task Order
- Eglin AFB, FL Task Order
- Kingsley Field (ANG), OR Task Order
- Kelly Field (ANG), TX Task Order
- Tyndall AFB, FL Task Order
Future task orders which may be issued later, but for which you don’t have to submit at technical proposal are:
- Nellis AFB, NV Task Order
- Luke AFB, AZ Task Order
- Seymour Johnson AFB, SC Task Order
- Holloman AFB, NM Task Order
- Tucson (ANG), AZ Task Order
- Hill AFB, UT Task Order
Each of the technical proposals has four technical subfactors:
- Human resource (recruitment/retention, pilot training/qualifications, and pilot currency.
- Aircraft sustainment (logistics plan, extended support structure)
- Aircraft availability
- Aircraft enhancements
Of note is the Section H discussion of cross-teaming. So, it is possible to bid as a prime on task orders and as a subcontractor on other task orders. The admonition is for you to disclose during the proposal phase or post-proposal submission, before the arrangement becomes effective.
Large business primes are required to submit a subcontracting plan with 20% of the total annual contract value being awarded to small business subcontractors. Additionally, the large business shall identify the percentage of business to be awarded to Veteran-Owned Small Business, Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business, HUB-Zone Small Business, Small Disadvantaged Business, and Women-Owned Small Business.
We encourage you to visit the solicitation on the FBO website (or GowWin) as there are many questions/answers posted already.
The team at GDI Consulting stands ready to assist you in any way you need. Our staff of proposal managers, writers, and editors have many years of experience writing for a variety of agencies, and we would happily help put your team in the skies to train USAF pilots.
