SmallGovCon
Small business federal contracting commentary.
SmallGovCon Week in Review: December 2-6, 2024
Happy December! How’s the holiday shopping going so far? It seems the shopping time is even shorter than ever with Thanksgiving being so late this year. Oh boy! And the calendar is busy with so many events happening in December, it’s difficult to choose. This Saturday is the 24th
Koprince Law LLC · Dec 6, 2024
Govology Webinar: December 12, 2024 – The 2024 Government Contracting Year-End Review
Please join Nicole Pottroff and me for this informative webinar, where we will discuss important new small business rules and updates, changes to 8(a) Program certification, joint venture modifications, HUBZone certification updates (including the new extensive HUBZone proposed r
Koprince Law LLC · Dec 5, 2024
Proposed Increases to Micro-Purchase, Simplified Acquisition, and Other Thresholds
Every five years, the government is required by 41 U.S.C. § 1908 to adjust the statutory acquisition thresholds for inflation, such as the Micro-Purchase Threshold, Simplified Acquisition Threshold, and others. It just so happens that the last such adjustment occurred back in 202
Koprince Law LLC · Dec 4, 2024
Thank you, SmallGovCon Readers!
On behalf of our attorney-authors at SmallGovCon, I wanted to take this opportunity to express our gratitude for all of our loyal blog readers. We love that SmallGovCon is such a great resource for contractors and professions in the federal contracting space. We appreciate your f
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 27, 2024
2024 GAO Bid Protest Report: Numbers Down, Effectiveness Still Even Odds
As we look forward to fall traditions like turkey and mashed potatoes, pumpkin spice, and leaf peeping, don’t sleep on another fall tradition, the GAO bid protest report. This report is GAO’s summary of bid protests for the previous fiscal year. It contains some important insight
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 25, 2024
GovCon FAQs: Do I need an SBA MPA for a JV?
We at SmallGovCon are excited to announce this first in a new line of blogs we call GovCon FAQs. Our firm handles a wide variety of federal procurement and contract matters, from bid protests, size protests, joint ventures, socio-economic certifications, to everything in between.
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 22, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review: November 18-22, 2024
Happy Friday, SmallGovCon readers and have a great Thanksgiving next week! We won’t be posting our weekly roundup next week due to the holiday, but we’ll catch up on any missed news the following week. In the meantime, enjoy this week’s federal contracting news. Also be sure to e
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 22, 2024
Update: SBA Proposed Rule Would Require “Rule of Two” Application to Multiple Award Contract Task and Delivery Orders (Part I)
SBA’s recently proposed rule seeks to officially broaden the reach of its “Rule of Two”–a government contracting requirement fundamental to supporting our nation’s small business infrastructure, policies, and goals. I emphasize “officially” because, even though this is technicall
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 21, 2024
Webinar event: The SBA and DoD Mentor-Protégé Programs, December 3, 2024, hosted by Kansas APEX Accelerators
Please join us on December 3, 2024, 9:30-11:30am CST for this webinar event. Touted as a game-changer when it was first introduced in 2016, the U.S. Small Business Administration’s All Small Mentor-Protege Program isn’t new anymore. Known now as simply the SBA Mentor-Protege Prog
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 19, 2024
OHA: SBA VetCert Review of Bylaws Was too Strict
We have previously blogged on SBA OHA decisions where an applicant was denied certification in one of SBA’s socioeconomic programs because the applicant failed to meet SBA’s control requirements. (You can check out some recent posts here and here). These decisions served as frien
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 18, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review; November 11-15, 2024
Happy Friday! We hope you had a great week and are looking forward to the weekend. We have had some beautiful Fall weather here in the Midwest and finally received some much needed rain. It’s hard to believe the holidays are right around the corner! Please visit SmallGovCon often
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 15, 2024
Dialing Down: SAM Registration Not Constantly Required
As we’ve written about on the blog, protests have been decided because the offeror was not registered in SAM for the entirety of the proposal review process period. For instance, in this post, we discussed a GAO decision where GAO held that the FAR requires offerors to maintain S
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 12, 2024
Veteran’s Day: Thank You for Your Service
Today, at SmallGovCon, we would like to take this opportunity to honor all the veterans and active-duty military for their service. The first celebration using the term Veterans Day occurred in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1947. Raymond Weeks, a World War II veteran, organized “Nation
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 11, 2024
Compensation for Professional Employees and You: GAO Sustains Where Agency Doesn’t Explain Why Proposed Decreased Compensation is Reasonable
While the federal government uses wage determinations for many occupations that contractors must abide by, things are different with professional occupations such as physicians, accountants, engineers, and (yours truly) attorneys. Contractors generally have more leeway with regar
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 8, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review: November 4-8, 2024
Hello, blog readers! We want to extend a special thank you to all the veterans and active-duty military as we approach Veterans Day. Thank you for your service. Enjoy the weekend. It’s Friday and it’s time for another week in review. With the recent election behind us, the focus
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 8, 2024
Webinar Event: Legal Updates 2024 hosted by the Catalyst Center for Business & Entrepreneurship, November 20, 2024
The Catalyst Center for Business & Entrepreneurship is hosting this helpful, virtual workshop on Legal Updates 2024. In this webinar, government contracting attorneys, Nicole Pottroff and John Holtz will discuss the most important legal developments for federal contractors in 202
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 6, 2024
SBA OHA: Operating Agreements Must Clearly Demonstrate Control
A recent appeal before the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) upheld SBA’s denial of an application for a veteran-owned small business because its operating agreement gave too much control to a non-veteran owner and failed to identify a vete
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 5, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review: October 28-November 1, 2024
Hello, Blog Readers and happy November! We hope you have had a productive month and are looking forward to finishing strong this year. It’s that time of year for looking at fall colors and going to the pumpkin patch, and handing out candy to trick or treaters. We hope you have a
Koprince Law LLC · Nov 1, 2024
Thank You, COFC Judicial Conference
I recently returned from the 35th Annual Judicial Conference for the Court of Federal Claims. I wanted to send a hearty thanks to all of the organizers of the conference, especially Judge Tapp! It was a great opportunity presenting on the topic of Private Conflicts: How the New P
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 29, 2024
GAO Sustain: Offeror’s Failure to Follow Solicitation’s Document Preparation Instructions was Unstated Evaluation Criteria
A recent GAO decision considered whether an agency could reject an offeror’s proposal based on the offeror’s failure to follow document preparation instructions that were not explicitly stated in the solicitation. In Hometown Veterans Medical, LLC B-422751 (Oct. 11, 2024), the De
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 28, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review: October 21-25, 2024
Happy Friday! I just got back from presenting at the 35th Judicial Conference for the United States Court of Federal Claims. It was a great experience and I got to learn from some very smart folks. But the wheel of federal contracting keeps turning, and this week was no different
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 25, 2024
OHA: Show me the Management, or Fail SDVOSB Certification
A recent OHA decision reminds us that it’s important to show and tell the SBA how a company seeking certification is meeting the SBA’s requirements for control of a socioeconomic company. Like many of these decisions involving SBA’s programs, it comes out of the Service-Disabled
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 25, 2024
Event Announcement: NAPEX Fall Conference 2024
We are excited to announce that Nicole Pottroff will be attending the Fall NAPEX conference in Washington DC and will be presenting on legal updates on October 30. The conference gives agencies and primes the opportunity to promote supplier diversity programs and learn how the AP
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 21, 2024
SmallGovCon Week in Review: October 14-18, 2024
Hello, SmallGovCon readers. We hope you are enjoying some nice fall weather wherever you are, here in Kansas our temperatures are finally down in the 70s, which has been a welcome relief. Some articles we’ve highlighted this week include multiple takes on the new CMMC rule finali
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 18, 2024
Preview Shows Changes to 8(a) Application in New SBA Portal
As many in federal contracting know, the SBA had its certification portal (certify.sba.gov) closed for upgrades for a few months. The SBA is replacing it with a new portal called MySBA Certifications which as of the writing of this blog post is now live. While it hasn’t been wide
Koprince Law LLC · Oct 17, 2024