Small Business Set-Aside. This is a notice that this order is for Small Businesses. Only quotes submitted by Small Businesses will be accepted by the Government. Any quote that is submitted by a contractor that is not a Small Business will not be considered for award. BASIS FOR AWARD: Government will award a contract from this solicitation to the responsible offeror whose offer conforming to this solicitation will be most advantageous to the government price and other factors considered. Factors 1 and 2 are of equal value and are significantly more important than cost. The following factors shall be used to evaluate offerors: Factor 1 Past Performance: Contractor must provide references, minimum of three (3), of previously completed service contracts, within the past five (5) years that involved sample analysis for freshwater, preferably riverine, phytoplankton. The Government may contact those references provided. Their statements will be used in the evaluation of the contractor's offer under any and all applicable evaluation criteria. Past performance information provided by references, from Government records, or from other than the sources identified by the offeror may be used in the evaluation under any or all applicable evaluation factors. In addition to the foregoing, PIPRS.gov will be used as a source of past performance information in the source selection process, in addition to any other past performance information required under this solicitation. All past performance information will be used for both the responsibility determination and the best value decision. Factor 2 Qualifications: Contractor must provide a listing of personnel performing the work, their laboratory credentials, certifications, awards and accreditation for phytoplankton identification and quantification. All work must be performed at a certified laboratory, by qualified technicians. Listings should include education, work experience and number of years employed in this capacity. Previous experience working with riverine phytoplankton should also be included. Factor 3 - Price - Vendor shall provide pricing for 980 samples for phytoplankton identification and quantification services in accordance with the Scope of Work. Vendor shall also include cost estimate for sample condition review and diatom only ID for those cases where sample degradation prohibits the identification or quantification of the full phytoplankton community. (b) A written notice of award or acceptance of an offer, mailed or otherwise furnished to the successful offeror within the time for acceptance specified in the offer, shall result in a binding contract without further action by either party. Before the offer's specified expiration time, the Government may accept an offer (or part of an offer), whether or not there are negotiations after its receipt, unless a written notice of withdrawal is received before award. Award The award of this requirement shall be made using the policies in the Federal Acquisition Regulations FAR Part 8, Required Sources of Supplies and Services and FAR Part 12, Acquisition of Commercial Items, in conjunction with the policies and procedures for solicitation, evaluation, and award prescribed in Part 13.5, Simplified Acquisition Procedures for Certain Commercial Items, as appropriate for this acquisition. Each offeror is cautioned to study the Evaluation Factors stated above along with their relative importance. Your proposal package shall address each of these factors since these are the standards against which your proposal will be evaluated. It is the offeror's responsibility to include the appropriate documentation in their proposal to allow a completed technical/price evaluation. Simply repeating or paraphrasing the specifications or statement of work does not constitute an acceptable technical proposal. Failure to submit the appropriate documentation may result in the rejection of the offeror's proposal. A single award shall be made to the vendor whose proposal, conforming to this Solicitation, it determined to be most advantageous to the government, cost or price and other non-cost or non-price factors listed above. In determining which proposal offers the greatest value or advantage to the Government, overall past performance and technical experience will be significantly more important than evaluated price or cost to the Government. Price or cost will become the determining factor between proposals judged to be essentially equal in technical merit. While the Government anticipates award based primarily on technical superiority, no award will be made based on superior technical capability when the proposed cost or price is considered unreasonable or when the additional cost or price is not justified by the advantages of an award based on technical superiority. The offeror is cautioned to study the Evaluation Factors stated above along with their relative importance. Your proposal package shall address each of the factors listed above since these are the standards against which your proposal will be evaluated. It is the offeror's responsibility to include the appropriate documentation in its proposal package to allow a complete technical and price evaluation. Failure to submit the appropriate documentation may result in the rejection of the offeror's proposal. All technical proposals shall be separate from pricing proposals. No pricing shall be contained in the technical proposal. Offerors are required to list discounts, if any, as part of their pricing proposal, but separate from the original unit price.
