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Please note, this notice revision is to communicate to industry NASA/GSFC’s intention to proceed forward decoupling the requirements as previously publicized below. Also, it is anticipated that a draf... Please note, this notice revision is to communicate to industry NASA/GSFC’s intention to proceed forward decoupling the requirements as previously publicized below. Also, it is anticipated that a draft request for proposal (DRFP) for each requirement, respectively, will be publicized in Q1 FY2025. No responses are being accepted at this time. Interested firms are responsible for monitoring this website for the release of any solicitation, synopsis, or information and are encouraged to select “Follow” in SAM.gov for updates and changes. Points of Contact are as follows: 1) For the Network O&M&S - Sandra Grello at sandra.r.grello@nasa.gov, Vir Thanvi at vir.thanvi@nasa.gov, and Jerome Butler at jerome.butler@nasa.gov. 2) For the Network Development/Implementation - Patrick Dewyngaert at patrick.b.dewyngaert@nasa.gov, Vir Thanvi at vir.thanvi@nasa.gov, and Rene Wong-Pineiro at rene.wongpineiro@nasa.gov. The Exploration and Space Communications Projects Division (ESC) is a national resource located at Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) which enables scientific discovery and space exploration by providing innovative and mission-effective space communications and navigation solutions to a large community of diverse customers. ESC manages the Near Space Network (NSN) for the Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) Program at NASA Headquarters. ESC customers include NASA, other government agencies, commercial, and foreign partner missions. The NSN supports customer missions in near space (surface of Earth to two million kilometers) through entire lifecycle and provides communications and navigation services through orchestrated blend of Government and Commercial providers. While providing superb customer support, ESC is continuously evolving toward capabilities and capacities that meet the needs of future customers. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Exploration and Space Communications Project Division (ESC) is hereby soliciting responses from potential sources for capabilities, ideas, and information that will be used for network operations, maintenance, and sustainment for the NSN, other government assets, and services which support multiple missions across the full NASA portfolio as well as Space Exploration, Communications, and Navigation capabilities implementation. This notice is issued for information and planning purposes and to allow industry the opportunity to verify reasonableness and feasibility of the requirements. It is the intent of NASA/GSFC/ESC to use the information received in response to this Request for Information (RFI)/Sources Sought Notice (SSN) to access the capabilities of industry to meet the requirements, foster partnering among interested firms, and to promote competition. NASA/GSFC/ESC is seeking capability statements from all interested parties, including all socioeconomic categories of Small Businesses and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU)/Minority Institutions (MI), and members of the underserved communities as defined by Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities through the Federal Government, for the purposes of determining the appropriate level of competition and/or small business subcontracting goals for the potential requirements identified below. The Government reserves the right to consider a Small, 8(a), Women-owned Small Business (WOSB), Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SD-VOSB), Economically Disadvantaged Women-owned Small Business (EDWOSB), or Historically Under-utilized Business Zone (HUBZone) business set-aside based on the responses received. Within NASA/GSFC, the ESC manages the operation, maintenance, and sustainment (O&M&S) of NASA’s NSN and other government assets. For the NSN, this includes O&M&S of government-owned flight assets that provide Space Relay services (e.g. the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) constellation, distributed over the Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and Indian Ocean) and associated ground stations, set of government-owned ground antennas that provide Direct-to-Earth services, as well as network systems that orchestrate a blend of services from government-owned and commercial providers assets. ESC also manages development and capability implementation initiatives to enable the network as well as customer missions. Examples of capability implementation include network software systems (e.g., Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN), Network Services Orchestration System), antenna development (e.g., RF antennas to support lunar missions, Satellite Laser Ranging (SLR) antennas), optical ground stations, and optical flight modules. Currently the operations, maintenance, sustainment, and development of the NSN and other government assets are performed under the SENSE contract, an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract. At this time, NASA/GSFC is contemplating decoupling the SENSE Follow-On procurement into two different but related procurements among other strategies. This RFI/SSN addresses the potential contract vehicles that may potentially replace the current SENSE contract under this scenario as follows: 1) The Network Operations, Maintenance, and Sustainment requirements to be potentially procured as a single-award contract for O&M&S of the NSN and other government assets and projects. The scope of work for this potential procurement is focused on enabling mission success by providing highly reliable communication and navigation services to all NSN customers through safe, secure, and efficient O&M&S of the NSN assets. Additional potential support may include spectrum management, mission integration services, mission analyses, and other NASA functions including the O&M&S of assets and systems that transition from implementation into operations. Attachment 1 depicts the high-level scope for the potential operations, maintenance, and sustainment contract. 2) The Space Exploration, Communications, and Navigation Capabilities Implementation requirements to be potentially procured as multiple-award contracts for the development/implementation of new efforts for the NSN and other government projects. Under this approach, the Government would seek to build a catalog of providers for each of the implementation categories including, but not limited to the ones listed in Attachment 2 and negotiate IDIQ task as the demand or need arises. No solicitation exists; therefore, do not request a copy of the solicitation. If additional information or a solicitation is released, it will be synopsized on SAM.gov. Interested firms are responsible for monitoring this website for the release of any solicitation, synopsis, or information and are encouraged to select “Follow” in SAM.gov for updates and changes. Interested firms having the required capabilities necessary to meet the above requirements described in the above attachments, should submit a capability statement for each of the applicable Attachment 1 and/or 2, indicating the ability to perform all aspects of the effort (single-spaced, 12-point font, Times New Roman) in preferred Microsoft Word file format. The following file naming convention should be used: Network O&M&S RFI/SSN company name.doc and/or Space Exploration-Communications-Navigation Capabilities Implementation RFI/SSN company name.doc. Instructions for Capability Statement Submittals: The Government is seeking information from qualified, experienced sources that have the required capabilities necessary to meet some or all the high-level requirements described in Attachment 1 and/or Attachment 2. Interested parties should submit a capability statement and provide additional input requested in this RFI/SSN of no more than 15 pages for the requirements in each attachment. Specifically indicate your interest in performing as a prime and/or subcontractor and provide specific details that would demonstrate your firm’s ability to perform some or all aspects of the effort. Additionally, this RFI/SSN requests industry perspective on potential industry partnership opportunities, delivery strategies, cost or time saving measures and efficiencies, and lessons learned/suggestions to be considered for related future acquisitions. Section 1: Provide the following information regarding your firm: (a) CAGE Code, name and address of responding company, respondent points of contact (including phone number and email), size of the business, average annual revenue for past 3 years and average number of employees for last 3 years; (b) type of business and number of years in business: indicate large, small, small disadvantaged, 8(a), women-owned, veteran-owned, service-disabled-veteran owned, HUBZone small businesses, and Historically Black Colleges and Universities/Minority Institutions; (c) Affiliate information: parent company, joint venture partners, potential teaming partners, prime contractor (if potential subcontractor) or subcontractors (if potential prime contractor); (d) Indicate if your interest is as a potential prime contractor or subcontractor and (e) provide information regarding the companies facility security clearance status. Section 2: Detail your firm’s (a) ability to perform some or all of the high-level requirements in Attachment 1 and/or Attachment 2. In the response, indicate which requirements are applicable to the respondent’s areas of expertise and past performance; (b) list of customers covering worked performed within the past three (3) years (if applicable, please list at least 3 customers) highlighting relevant work performed, technical description, contract number, contract type, dollar value of each procurement, NAICS code, and procurement and technical points of contact (email address and phone number). If a small business concern is interested to participate at the prime contractor level, provide specifics details reflecting your capabilities to perform the broad requirements and note the requirement to comply FAR 52.219-14, Limitations on Subcontracting regarding similarly situated firms. The scope of work that may be addressed includes identification of innovative concepts, architecture domains and views; roadmaps and plans for modernization; enhancements and sustainment of new and existing systems that support current and future architectures. This may include the identification and evaluation of technologies, standards, and concepts which may be incorporated into the network systems to enhance network performance. Section 3: Provide input regarding the potential acquisition approach (i.e., splitting the contract), particularly the contract type and single/multiple award approaches; input regarding evaluation criteria/parameters to assess performance and to motivate excellence in performance; and input regarding the performance period. Please advise if any of the above requirements are considered to be a commercial or commercial-type product. A commercial item is defined in FAR 2.101. Additionally, in support of Executive Order (EO) 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, NASA/GSFC is seeking to advance Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) and remove barriers for members of underserved communities related to this requirement. As defined in the EO, Underserved Communities refers to populations sharing a particular characteristic, as well as geographic communities, that have been systematically denied a full opportunity to participate in aspects of economic, social, and civic life, as exemplified by the list in the preceding definition of “equity.” Equity means the consistent and systemic fair, just, and impartial treatment of all individuals, including individuals who belong to underserved communities that have been denied such treatment, such as Black, Latino, Indigenous an Native American persons, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, and other persons of color; members of religious minorities; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) persons; persons with disabilities; persons who live in rural areas; and persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality. Interested firms are highly encouraged to gain a full understanding of the EO and NASA’s strategic plans to meet the EO. The following is provided for reference only: https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-launches-mission-equity-seeks-public-input-to-broaden-access. Separate from the capability statement and associated page limit identified above, NASA seeks input in the following areas: To support the requirements identified in this RFI/SSN, what barriers or opportunities exist to engage subject matter experts from industry and academia and how can those barriers be overcome? How can underserved communities be leveraged? To support the requirements identified in this RFI/SSN, what barriers or opportunities exist to partner with subcontractors that employ members of underserved communities? What other recommendation would you make to enhance diversity and inclusion? What should be considered to encourage full participation and contribution of organizations and individuals (e.g., outreach efforts and innovative partnerships) in performance of this requirement? All responses shall be submitted electronically via email no later than November 30, 2023, at 2 PM Eastern Standard Time (EST) as follows: 1) For the Network O&M&S - Sandra Grello at sandra.r.grello@nasa.gov, Vir Thanvi at vir.thanvi@nasa.gov, and Jerome Butler at jerome.butler@nasa.gov. 2) For the Network Development/Implementation - Patrick Dewyngaert at patrick.b.dewyngaert@nasa.gov, Vir Thanvi at vir.thanvi@nasa.gov, and Rene Wong-Pineiro at rene.wongpineiro@nasa.gov. Any information submitted in response to this RFI/SSN that is marked as “Confidential Commercial or Financial Information” will be considered as voluntarily submitted in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act. All responses will be treated as sensitive and competitive information. Respondents should appropriately mark any proprietary data. All information requested shall be UNCLASSIFIED. This synopsis is for information and planning purposes only and is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government nor will the Government pay for information solicited. In accordance with FAR 15.201(e), responses to this notice are not offers and cannot be accepted by NASA to form a binding contract. NASA is under no obligation to issue a solicitation or to award any contract based on this RFI/SSN. Respondents will not be notified of the results of the evaluation. NASA intends to publicize a listing of respondents to facilitate teaming arrangements. Should your firm desire not to be included in this listing, clearly indicate this desire in your response.