State Department unveils $10B enterprise IT services solicitation

Industry now has the green light to start working on proposals for a potential seven-year, $10 billion enterprise IT services contract vehicle at the State Department.

Proposals for the first phase of this two-part source selection for the Evolve contract are due by 2 p.m. Eastern time on Jan. 18, 2023.

Notices on who will move onto phase two could go out during the month of April 2023, the department said in the final solicitation released Friday.

Bidders will then find out whether or not their proposals are competitive for an award, thus acting as an encouragement to participate in phase two or perhaps not. Further directions on how to approach phase two including the timeline for it will also be included.

Evolve will be the department's main acquisition vehicle for acquiring technology modernization services in support of its diplomatic goals across areas such as cybersecurity, data analysis, climate, health and workforce accessibility.

The department plans to award 34 positions across five functional categories:

• IT management services -- eight total awards with four reserved for small businesses
• Cloud and data center services -- six total awards with four reserved for small businesses
• Application development services -- eight total awards with four reserved for small businesses
• Network and telecommunication services -- six total awards
• Customer and end user support services -- six total awards

Bidders have some room to pursue an award across multiple categories with one big restriction to keep in mind.

In order to avoid organizational conflicts-of-interest, companies selected for an award in the IT management category may not perform work in any of the other four.

Self-scoring will be the department's methodology for determining which phase one proposals are the most likely to be competitive in phase two and therefore an award.

Evolve is the follow-on contract to the current Vanguard program, which Science Applications International Corp. has performed work under since 2010.

The department is also looking for more avenues to consolidate its IT services buying activity under Evolve.

At least 11 incumbent contracts are identified as having immediate potential to be bundled into this new procurement, as said in this determination and findings report released Nov. 15 on Sam.gov.