Inactive

Sources Sought Notice (SSN)/Draft Performance Work Statement (PWS) Notice ID: 24-002-OITA 1. Synopsis THIS IS A SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE FOR MARKET RESEARCH ONLY – NO AWARD WILL BE MADE FROM THIS NOTICE.... Sources Sought Notice (SSN)/Draft Performance Work Statement (PWS) Notice ID: 24-002-OITA 1. Synopsis THIS IS A SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE FOR MARKET RESEARCH ONLY – NO AWARD WILL BE MADE FROM THIS NOTICE. This is being released for informational purposes to assist the IRS and is subject to change. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is seeking responses from potential contractors with the skills and capabilities necessary to perform the requirements outlined in the attached draft PWS Application Programming Interface (API) Management Platform specifications document. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR QUOTE OR PROPOSAL. Responses to this announcement are not considered quotes or offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. The Government shall not be held responsible for any costs incurred in the response to this Sources Sought Notice. The IRS is looking to identify: Small businesses (e.g., 8(a), service-disabled veteran owned small business, HUBZone small business, small -disadvantaged business, veteran-owned small business and woman-owned small business) that can perform the requirements outlined in the draft PWS. Large business that can perform the requirements outlined in the draft PWS, including large businesses that are able to incorporate a small business participation plan. 2. Background The Applications Development (AD) Organization is responsible for building, unit testing, delivering, and maintaining integrated applications systems to support modernized and legacy systems in production. As the development organization for systems that manage taxpayer accounts, AD is a key component of tax processing/filing season activities. Through the adoption of a Rapid Delivery Model for Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Information Technology, AD is leading the way to world class collaboration with business organizations and IT delivery partners. The AD Technical Integration Organization (TIO) was stood up to provide strategic technical direction within the Organization and ensure guidance and consolidation for tactical issues of a technical nature. The goal of the program is to provide integrated technical direction across the AD portfolio adhering to the IRS Guiding Principles and drive activities in alignment with the Information Technology (IT) Roadmap and AD Vision. The TIO vision is to identify, understand, and close technical gaps within AD; provide technical leadership and communication across AD and TIO Service Delivery Partners. This approach is intended to break down barriers toward driving efficiency and consistency of standards and practices across the AD portfolio. One of the newest initiatives to be bestowed to the TIO is the creation and implementation of the IRS Application Programming Interface (API) strategy. To achieve this mission, the TIO is entrusting one of its branches, Application Innovation Branch (AIB), to tackle this initiative. The AIB has numerous years in developing enterprise APIs and is the owner of the Enterprise API Gateway (EAG). The EAG serves as a vital solution to implementing the IRS API Strategy. With the experience in building enterprise APIs and owning the EAG, the AIB was the logical choice for the IRS to implement their strategy. AIB will collaborate efforts to support the IRS infrastructure and to transform the technology platform to one that is shared, lowers its total cost of ownership (TCO), and that enables the IRS to conduct environment planning, provide release management activities, manage technical integration, provide for secure coding integration practices and technical problem resolution. The work supported shall provide development and application integration services for new software releases to include, testing and deployment support for the IRS Integrated Enterprise Portal (IEP) environment as well as post-production deployment efforts in preparation for transition to production operations. Moreover, it shall provide technical support, development and testing for new software releases related to Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Form(s) capabilities and Reporting Data Delivery support and testing activities, which will define IRS requirements for the services that will provide enhancements for current development efforts as well as future legislation. 3. Objectives The Contractor shall assist in the analysis of program upgrades and enhancements that are outlined in Technical Direction(s) from the COR. This includes developing technical evaluations, identifying, and documenting requirements, performing architectural design, development, testing and deployment that support legislative new requirements for the IRS modernized applications and services. This support will include making xml schema changes, create Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messages, generate authentication and authorization processes, and employ virus scanning and threat mitigation procedures. Support shall include the development and database tuning, running queries and creating reports. The Contractor shall support the tracking and reporting of transaction log data and capture log response times. This will enable the Program to identify trends and provide timely responses to IRS executives’ requests for information about transmissions and errors. The Contractor shall develop alternative analyses and business cases. The business cases shall be properly documented, and briefings and presentations will be authored to summarize the analyses and business cases. The Contractor shall develop, document, and maintain program, project, and transition plans during the life of the plan. The Contractor shall edit existing data and create or write code so that applications, programs, or software are capable of interfacing with IRS specific applications, programs, or software for analytical and statistical purposes. Adhere to milestones and processes that will be used in developing the service(s). Provide presentations on relevant topics for consideration in developing service requirements. The Contractor shall provide project support for the transition and implementation of IT and FM related services and programs. The Contractor shall conduct assessments of implementation and operations requirements, testing, and assist in providing implementation planning, program management, and the development of test and acceptance criteria. Participate in requirements and architectural consensus briefings, provide meeting minutes, and reports to present outcomes of those briefings. Provide support for solution analysis, design, development, testing, and implementation of operational enhancements which integrate with IRS systems. Overseeing complete software delivery lifecycle by providing extensive business analysis, development, data modeling, and testing through knowledge sharing, peer reviews, managing documentation and QA of team deliverables to ensure high quality work products. Maintaining/updating processes to perform peer to peer development code reviews. Ensuring that the system can receive and validating synch and async ACA requests, providing receipt status notifications, performing error message handling, and processing, and transmitting data to Legacy/Current processing environment systems. Supporting the analysis of software concepts, approaches, and requirements to support the system design, and generate software specifications, related to the specialized needs of the Information Sharing & Reporting project. Supporting the provision of systems architecture maintenance for coordination and integration with the IRS enterprise architecture model. Supporting the development and maintenance of tools to aid engineering tasks, such as system synthesis/design, modeling or simulation, trade studies & risk analysis/mitigation. Providing support for production incidents - triage, assessment calls, (root cause) analysis of incidents, monitoring and reporting on incident status. Complete Requirements Traceability Matrices (RTMs) that capture service requirements for the planned service(s) and that will be used for monitoring and reporting test results. The Contractor shall provide the RTMs at the end of analysis phase, design phase, build phase, deployment phase that designates he security requirements in a separate section so that they can be traced through the development life cycle. The Contractor will provide the application designs and test plan documentation, and source code to IRS for review. Custom-developed software source code shall be inspected during development and tested in a production-like environment using commercial vulnerability assessment tools. All vulnerabilities and negative findings shall be remediated by the Contractor or Subcontractor prior to production deployment unless a deviation is explicitly approved in writing by the IRS Designated Approving Authority (DAA). 4. Submission Information Responses to this notice shall demonstrate the respondent’s capability to perform the services outlined in the draft PWS. Potential small and large businesses shall demonstrate their knowledge, expertise, and experience in accordance with the PWS task requirements. RESPONSES TO THIS NOTICE SHALL BE NO MORE THAN 10 PAGES: The following information shall be included in Sources Sought Notice (SSN) responses: 1. Company Name and Unique Entity Identifier Number 2. Company Address 3. Name, phone number and email address of company representative 4. Type of company under North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 541512 - Computer Systems Design Services. Size Standard $30.0 Million (i.e., small business, 8(a), woman-owned, veteran-owned, etc.) as validated via the System for Award Management (SAM). Additional information on NAICS codes can be found at www.sba.gov. 5. Company socio-economic standing(s); i.e., large business, small business, veteran-owned small business, service-disabled veteran-owned small business, HUB Zone small business, small-disadvantaged business, or women-owned small business. 6. Best in Class (BIC) - Relevant BIC Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) or FSS Schedule Contract held by your company (e.g. 8(a) STARS II, Alliant 2, VETS, NITAAC). 7. Capability statement and/or letter of interest. 8. List three organizations that have similar types of services, size, scope, and complexity provided within the last three years – to include contract number, description of the requirement, dollar value, contract type, name and telephone number of the customer. 9. Briefly describe your company’s technical approach and methodology to the listed PWS tasks. 10. List your company’s key technical personnel qualifications. Are there qualifications/ certifications requirements for individuals or to the contractor who is performing the services? If so, what are they and do they apply to this acquisition? 11. Has your company had multiple Cloud Implementation Experiences, Technical Implementation Criteria, using Standards, Guidelines, etc.? 12. Does your company have experience with AWS Cloud Implementation? 13. Does your company have any Middleware Platform Projects, and COTS implementation experience? 14. Does your company have the capability to provide personnel with the requisite security clearances? 15. Can your company meet all the performance objectives outlined in the PWS? 16. Will any PWS tasks require a subcontractor? 5. Submission Requirements: All capability statements shall be submitted via email to the point of contact listed below. The title of the email shall read “API Management Platform.” Responses shall be limited to 10 single-sided pages, not including the required business information and cover page. Pages should be single-spaced, minimum 11-point Times New Roman font with a minimum of one- inch margins on all sides. Responses shall not contain any brochures, advertising or any other type of extraneous, graphic literature or documents that have not been requested and are not relevant or essential in demonstrating the company’s ability to provide the required services. Vendors may provide links to relevant websites, as appropriate. The deadline for responses to this SSN is 5:00PM EST, 1/11/2024. Responses should be sent electronically to Tia Alami, at tia.alami@irs.gov with a courtesy copy to Alexandra McGhee, at alexandra.c.mcghee@irs.gov. IRS will not entertain questions regarding this market research. Disclaimer and Important Notes: This notice is for information and planning purposes only and does not constitute a solicitation for bids, quotes, or proposals. This notice does not obligate the Government to solicit for this requirement or award a contract and does not obligate the Government to reimburse interested parties for any costs incurred to prepare or provide a response to this source sought notice. The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Any organization responding to this notice should ensure that its response is complete and sufficiently detailed to allow the Government to determine the organization’s qualifications to perform the work. Respondents are advised that the Government is under no obligation to acknowledge receipt of the information received or provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted. No reimbursement will be made for any costs associated with providing information in response to this announcement or any follow-up information requests. Respondents will NOT be notified of the results of this analysis. All data received in response to this Sources Sought synopsis that is marked or designated as corporate or proprietary information will be fully protected from release outside the Government. The Government shall not be liable for or suffer any consequential damages for any proprietary information not properly identified. Proprietary information will be safeguarded in accordance with all applicable Government regulations. All documentation shall become the property of the Government and will not be returned. ** THE GOVERNMENT WILL NOT RESPOND TO PHONE CALLS. **