Protest challenging the agency’s past performance evaluation is denied, where the solicitation provided the agency could assess the past performance of both a joint venture and its individual partners; and protest challenging the agency’s responsibility determination of the awardee is denied, where the SBA reviewed the awardee’s eligibility and concluded it was responsible.
Dextera Corporation protested the Social Security Administration’s award of a support service contract to Advancia-Ahtna Joint Venture LLC, challenging the agency’s evaluation of Advancia-Ahtna’s experience and past performance and its determination that Advancia-Ahtna is a responsible firm.
First, Dextera argued that the agency should not have assigned Advancia-Ahtna ratings of very similar for experience and very good for past performance because all of the contracts used to demonstrate experience and past performance were performed by Ahtna, and there was no experience or past performance information for Advancia or for the joint venture entity Advancia-Ahtna. Dextera noted that the solicitation stated that the experience and past performance of the individual entities would be considered only to the extent it related to work they would perform on this NRC contract, and that the experience and past performance of the joint venture was more important than that of the individual entities.
According to Dextera, the agency ignored this language, since the protégé Advancia had no experience and would still perform on the contract. Dextera further argued that it was improper for the agency to rely on the experience and past performance of one member of the joint venture in evaluating the experience and past performance of the entire joint venture.
GAO disagreed. Since the joint venture itself had no experience or past performance, the agency relied on the experience and past performance of the entities to the joint venture, as provided in the solicitation. While the solicitation stated that the experience and past performance of the joint venture would be considered more important than the experience and past performance of the individual entities, the solicitation did not prohibit the agency from using the experience and past performance of the individual entities in its evaluation of the past performance of the joint venture. Further, the agency did not ignore Advancia’s lack of experience and past performance; the agency lowered the rating for experience from extremely similar to very similar and for past performance from excellent to very good.
Dextera also asserted that the agency treated Dextera and Advancia-Ahtna disparately, complaining that it was rated the same for past performance—very good—as Advancia, even though its ratings on the contracts used to evaluate past performance were higher. However, GAO found that while Dextera’s reference ratings were higher than Advancia-Ahtna’s, Dextera did not have past performance on a contract as relevant as Advancia-Ahtna’s. Dextera also complained that the evaluation mentioned only one of the many positive comments that were included in its ratings, but GAO found this argument unhelpful.
Finally, Dextera argued that the agency unreasonably concluded that Advancia-Ahtna is a responsible firm.
Dextera explained that in order to be an approved 8(a) joint venture, the 8(a) participant must be designated as the managing venture and an employee of the 8(a) participant must be the project manager. Further, when the SBA approves a mentor-protégé joint venture agreement, the individual approved as the project manager cannot be employed by the mentor and later become an employee of the protégé. According to Dextera, in its SBA 8(a) approved joint venture agreement, the joint venture listed an Advancia employee as the project manager, but in its proposal, it listed a current employee of Ahtna, who will become an employee of Advancia upon contract award, as the program manager. Dextera argued that the conflict between the joint venture agreement and the proposal rendered Advancia ineligible for award as an 8(a) contractor.
However, GAO found that SBA approved Advancia-Ahtna as a joint venture under the 8(a) program at the agency’s request. According to GAO, in making the responsibility determination, the contracting officer was not required to further consider whether Advancia-Ahtna was eligible for award since SBA’s regulations specifically provide that only SBA makes such eligibility determinations and SBA had, in fact, made the determination that Advancia-Ahtna was eligible.
Dextera Corporation is represented by Isaias Alba, IV, Michelle E. Litteken, Meghan F. Leemon, and Matthew E. Feinberg of Piliero Mazza PLLC. Advancia-Ahtna Joint Venture LLC is represented by Amy Laderberg O’Sullivan and Olivia L. Lynch of Crowell & Moring LLP. The government is represented by Ellen Rothschild, Sandra Jackson, and Ryan Warrenfeltz, Social Security Administration. GAO attorneys Mary G. Curcio and Laura Eyester participated in the preparation of the decision.
