BIC Vehicles -- GSA Schedule 70

What is a “best-in-class vehicle”?

BIC is an OMB destination.  It represents contract approaches where agencies should give priority for use.  It’s related to category management.

Yes, GSA  Group 70 Schedule is one.

Some references that support formerfed's response......

https://www.gsa.gov/buying-selling/category-management/bestinclass

https://www.acq.osd.mil/dpap/ss/docs/Best_In_Class_Contracts_12.22.17.pdf

How Does GSA determine which contract vehicles are best in class for different services/products?  For example,  IT Schedule 70 is specifically limited to a new narrow areas for best in class designation, e.g., computer desktops and laptops. There is no mention of Cybersecurity for Schedule 70.  But, in the White House's published  "Report to the President on Federal IT Modernization" there is specific mention of the relevance of the Cyber Security SIN for IT Schedule 70 (132-45).  

If one has passed the hurdles associated with this and related SINs in IT Schedule 70, it seems odd that these are diminished in value by not being included as Best in Class.  This also eliminates a number of otherwise qualified vendors who may have been impacted by the Alliant 2 Small Business protest-court decision.

Curiosis, 

GSA doesn’t decide best in class; OMB does. Check out the two links Carl provided above.  Even though the first is GSAs, it refers you to OMB information including the criteria used in designating. Also it’s contract and not vendor specific, and it’s largely geared towards achieving category management benefits.  While cyber security is important, it’s not a category management priority.

On 4/9/2019 at 4:44 PM, lawyergirl said:

!  Does anyone happen to know whether government agencies can leverage GSA Schedule 70 for IT Services (in particular) as a Best-in-class vehicle?

No.  Schedule 70 is Best in Class for Hardware and Software not Services.

BIC IT Services:

• 8(a) STARS
• Alliant
• NITAAC CIO-SP3
• VETS 2

There are many scenarios where none of these BIC are appropriate for IT Services.

• There is a lower-tier but better 'solution' (contract vehicle)
• Requirement out of scope of all of these
• Pool of Vendors Not Appropriate or Sufficient
• Indefinite Contract or BPA
• Non-Commercial