You are invited to submit a proposal in response to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center’s Geostationary Extended Observations (GeoXO) Atmospheric Composition (ACX) Instrument Implementation solicitation.  The Atmospheric Composition (ACX) is a hyperspectral, UV through visible imaging spectrometer, used to measure environment data as part of a 3-axis stabilized, geostationary weather satellite system. The ACX remotely collects imagery of the superregional area for national air quality forecasting capability, hazard forecasting, and fire pollutant forecasting and warnings.  The contract scope includes the tasks necessary to design, analyze, develop, fabricate, integrate, test, verify, and support launch of the ACX, supply and maintain the instrument Ground Support Equipment (GSE), and support the Mission Operations at the NOAA Satellite Operations Facility (NSOF). 

NASA will conduct this acquisition as a full and open competition.  The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code for this acquisition is 336414 and the small business size standard is 1,250 employees.  

This competitive acquisition will result in a Cost-Plus-Award Fee (CPAF) hardware contract for the development of one Flight Model (FM) and two options, for additional ACX FMs. The anticipated period of performance for this contract includes support for 10 years of on-orbit operations and 5 years of on-orbit storage, for a total of 15 years for each FM. 

The anticipated contract award date is on or about late April 2024.  The contract will be performed onsite at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and offsite at the Contractor’s facilities. 

Potential offerors should pay close attention to all solicitation instructions; however, the following requirements list is summarized to assist in proposal development.  Please note that this list is not exhaustive, and the solicitation terms and conditions and provisions in sections L and M take precedence:

1.  Section H.13, Special Task Support Requirements of the RFP specifies that the Government may order special study tasks under the resultant hardware contract for risk reduction and mitigation activities. The clause includes a plug number of $25,000,000 that each offeror can use for planning purposes.  

2.  Section L.11 GSFC 52.215-203 Offer Volume (APR 2022) of the RFP specifies:  If the offeror is involved in an impending or already consummated corporate transaction such as an acquisition, or merger with another company, or restructuring, whether announced publicly or not, the Offeror must provide information to convey any potential impacts of that corporate transaction on its proposal and any subsequent contract that may be awarded.

This list is not intended to cover all changes nor describe all RFP requirements. Offerors should carefully review the RFP in its entirety.

3. Below is a list of the Source Selection Authority (SSA) and voting members along with their associated NASA Goddard Space Flight Center organizational codes, for the Source Evaluation Board (SEB).  The names provided are for informational purposes only and other than the Contracting Officer, Tracey Jones, these individuals shall not be contacted regarding this acquisition.  The Government may change personnel associated with this acquisition at its discretion.

           SSA

           Cynthia Simmons, Code 400

           Voting Members

           Sergey Krimchansky, Code 418

           Kuiana Carson, Code 383

           Myron Fendall, Code 564

           Joanna Joiner, Code 614

           Vincent Roback, LARC-D208

4. Offerors are required to have a Commercial and Government Entity (CAGE) code that matches the corporate address submitted with its proposal.

Offerors are encouraged to refer to Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) provision 52.215-1, INSTRUCTIONS TO OFFERORS–COMPETITIVE ACQUISITION, in particular paragraph (f)(4) which discusses the Government’s right to award a contract without discussions.

In order to control and protect sensitive data owned by the Government and its Contractors, NASA policy required all acquisition-related documents be released in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF).  While the RFP’s Cost Volume exhibits are in PDF format, the Offeror’s Cost Volume proposal shall include completed Cost Volume exhibits in Microsoft Office Excel format with working cell formulas.  Instructions for converting from PDF format to Excel format can be found in the Cost Volume Instructions.    

Documents related to this acquisition, including this letter, the solicitation, attachments, exhibits, any amendments will be attainable electronically from the World Wide Web through the Government-wide point of entry website at www.SAM.gov. Potential Offerors are requested to periodically monitor the websites for updates.

NASA FAR Supplement (NFS) clause 1852.215-84, OMBUDSMAN, is applicable.  The Center Ombudsman for this acquisition can be found at http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/pub/pub_library/Omb.html.

This RFP does not commit NASA GSFC to pay any proposal preparation costs, nor does it obligate NASA GSFC to procure or contract for these services.  This request is not an authorization to proceed and does not authorize payment for any charges incurred by the offeror for performing any of the work called for in this solicitation.

Proposals submitted in response to this solicitation shall be due no later than December 11, 2023, at 5:00 pm, Eastern Standard Time. Proposal Marking and Delivery Through NASA’s EFSS Box” is included in the solicitation: Proposals for this solicitation are required to be submitted through NASA’s Enterprise File Sharing and Sync Box (EFSS Box), a FedRAMP Moderate certified platform.  Potential offerors, especially those that have not previously submitted a proposal utilizing NASA’s EFSS Box, are encouraged to review the solicitation instruction entitled “Electronic Proposal Delivery - Proposal Marking and Delivery Through NASA’s EFSS Box” which provides instructions related to the submission of proposal via EFSS Box.  Offerors are encouraged to check with their corporate IT staff to determine if there are firewall restrictions that would need to be addressed prior to the submission of proposal files through NASA’s EFSS Box.

In accordance with NFS 1815.201(f), a “Blackout Notice” has been issued to NASA personnel.  All inquiries/communications pertaining to this acquisition shall be directed only to the Contracting Officer listed below.

All questions regarding this RFP should be submitted in writing, electronically to Tracey Jones, Contracting Officer, at [email protected] on or before November 13, 2023.  Offerors are encouraged to submit questions as soon as possible for consideration.