The Navy plans to issue a pair of draft requests for proposals (RFP) in the comings months for the Next Generation Enterprise Network-Recompete (NGEN-R), a major information-technology effort, program officials said Jan. 25.
For the end-user hardware segment, the Navy expects to release a draft RFP in mid-March. A final RFP will follow in early June, and a contract award is slated for January 2018.
For the services segment, the Navy intends to issue a draft RFP in April. A final RFP will follow in July, and a contract award will occur in April 2018.
“We feel very confident that we’re going to have a robust amount of bidders for both of these” contracts, said Capt. Michael Abreu, program manager of the Naval Enterprise Networks program office.
Program officials provided the timelines during NGEN-R’s third industry day, held in a packed hotel ballroom in Tysons Corner, Va. They acknowledged that the schedules are aggressive, but they expressed confidence that the program will remain on track.
“We’ve worked long and hard to get to this point,” Abreu told reporters. “We are going to work very hard to hit our milestones, to hit our timelines.”
NGEN is the Navy Department’s current enterprise-wide information technology contract. The Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI) represents about 70 percent of the department’s IT operations.
The current NGEN contract, held by Hewlett Packard [HPQ], runs out in June 2018. The Navy hopes that by splitting the contract into two with NGEN-R, it can drive down costs. The two new prime contractors will be required to work together.
Other NGEN-R goals include improved cyber security, increased bandwidth, better collaboration tools, faster insertion of new technology and greater use of cloud computing.
Harry Oldland, program manager for information systems and infrastructure at Marine Corps Systems Command, said the Marines want to able to deploy with the same equipment they use stateside.
“The network has got to get all the way to the very edge of the battlefield,” including to a foxhole in Afghanistan, Oldland said.
The program intends to issue a request for information soon to help it fine-tune the draft RFPs.The Navy plans to award a single contract for each segment.
While prime contractor candidates will likely have to be large companies, the program has robust goals for small business participation, officials said. Over $300 million a year, or 35 percent of the current NGEN contract, goes to small business.