Small Businesses May Take Over $1B Supply Chain Recompete

The U.S. Department of State is considering making one of its largest global supply chain management contracts a small-business set aside, according to a sources-sought notice released July 24.

The Integrated Logistics Management System (ILMS) would be a massive opportunity for a small business, as the incumbent contract has generated more than $1.1 billion for Accenture PLC since March 2009. Accenture’s ILMS contract runs through the end of the 2020 fiscal year, though some task orders may run as far as the end of the 2023 fiscal year.

The ILMS supports the requisition, procurement, warehousing, distribution, transportation, receipt, and tracking of goods and services in more than 178 countries around the world, according to attached documents. Each year, the system manages nearly $11 billion in goods and medical supplies, $8.8 billion in federal assistance, and $5.5 billion in other financial assets.

The existing ILMS was built using a combination of more than 80 technologies, including commercial and custom software. It integrates with the State Department’s enterprise human resources and financial management systems, as well as governmentwide platforms such as the Federal Procurement Data System, SAM.gov, and GRANTS.gov. The contract also supports a 24/7 customer support desk for the estimated 66,000 ILMS users around the world.

The department lists the following mandatory qualifications that vendors must posses to be considered for the recompete contract:

• Vendors must be a leader in global supply chain management in the federal and commercial markets.
• Leadership in global systems integration is another must-have, capable of stitching together dozens of disparate technologies, software platforms, and federal databases.
• Leadership is also needed in global change management in which they are capable of managing complex and evolving requirements over the next decade.
• Vendors must have proven experience with systems of similar size, scope, and complexity.

Interested parties must respond with a 15-page capabilities statement no later than Aug. 3. The statements should describe their skills and experiences related to a series of functional and technical requirements, such as supply chain risk management, procure-to-pay systems, data warehousing and analytics, enterprise resource planning, document management, cloud computing, mobile application development, global training services, and communications.

This notice does not commit the State Department to issuing the follow-on work as a small-business set aside as it is still finalizing the ILMS acquisition strategy. Officials had also released a prior RFI in September 2019 that was open to all businesses.

To contact the analyst: Chris Cornillie in Washington at ccornillie@bgov.com

To contact the editor responsible: Daniel Snyder at dsnyder@bgov.com