U.S. government, military and prime contractors can now get a free demo on the 2 GHz: Rohde & Schwarz RTO 1024.     

The R&S RTO oscilloscopes combine excellent signal fidelity, high acquisition rate and the world’s first realtime digital trigger system with a compact device format in the 1 GHz and 2 GHz class. They offer hardware-accelerated measurement and analysis functions.  

• Find signal faults fast
• Hardware-accelerated analysis
• Highly accurate digital trigger system
• New ease of operation
• Convincing accuracy

• U.S. Government, military and prime contractor facilities only
• No obligation, costs or hidden fees
• Free shipping to and from your facility
• Limited slots available
• Open dates and product datasheet

Schedule a free 7-day field trial

Call GSAMart toll free at (888) 665-2765 x3745 or Sign up

The place to start is GSA’s own web pages. You need some basic information before you start into trying to determine market size. First you need to learn which GSA Schedule contract you are interested in pursuing. Start your research at the GSA E-Library www.gsaelibrary.gsa.gov. There is a link there on the right to the GSA Schedules listing. This is a list of all of the GSA schedules and what they cover. Or you can enter a search term representing the products or services you wish to research and let the search engine suggest schedules.

After selecting the GSA Schedule you need to determine the GSA Special Item Number or SIN that covers the specific products or services. For example, if I wanted to check the market for access control systems that are on entryways, I would find that they are Schedule 84, SIN 246 35 1 or 246 35 2 depending on whether they were proximity or other type systems. If I wanted to find out who already had those types of contracts, I could click on the SIN links and see the list of contract holders. I could also click on any of those contract holders and see what they offered and at what prices.

With this information the next step is to go to the GSA Schedule Sales Query (SSQ) tool to begin the market size research – https://ssq.gsa.gov/. Select “Create Report” and proceed to the report selection page. The SSQ report generator allows you to quickly select a preformatted report of the GSA Schedule sales. GSA offers eleven report formats. Some of the reports will instruct you to select a Schedule number, a Fiscal Year, a Contract number, or a Company name that you found from your search of the E-Library. The report formats are:

Selecting a report sample helps determine if that report will provide the information you require.

SSQ presents sales figures as reported to GSA by contractors. The reports are generated as quarterly reports for the current year and the past five fiscal years. The sales data reported are updated as contractors’ reports are received 30 days after the end of the quarter, but the data may not be up to date as it relies on the self-reporting of the contractors. The data is also only provided at the schedule, contractor and /or SIN level. This does not give you information about the market for a specific product, only a product type. However, GSA does provide the most accurate information available as to the GSA Schedule contract marketplace and it’s free. Happy hunting!

Things to Do Now:

• Research the GSA Schedule marketplace for your products or services.
• Determine if the market is sufficient for the investment into a GSA Schedule contract.
• Subscribe to GovContracts to receive notices of federal opportunities (http://search.govcontractsmagazine.com/contracts/fbosearch.cfm)
• To expand the government’s ability to access your products without worrying about the market size you can get your items on a GSA Schedule contract.
• Locate partners now such as Technical Communities who will act for you in the market.
• Make sure they have full access to the products or services that are in demand for the government markets.

Factors and subfactors

Every procurement must be evaluated based on evaluation factors and subfactors established before the release of the request for proposals. The government tailors those factors and subfactors to represent areas of importance for source selection and provide a basis for meaningful comparison among competing proposals. Agencies have broad discretion in establishing evaluation factors and subfactors and determining the relative importance of those factors. As a capture manager, you want to discuss those factors and their relative importance and offer guidance to the agency, if requested.

Technical, management and other evaluation factors

Noncost evaluation factors must be established to assess the quality of proposed solutions, services or products. Those factors can include technical approach, management capability, personnel qualifications, prior experience or small-business participation, among others. Some agencies prescribe a standard set of evaluation factors for their procurements and then add factors specific to a procurement as needed. As a capture manager, you want to know what factors are required and what optional factors the agency might consider. After an agency selects factors, it tailors subfactors for each one to outline important considerations in the procurement and provide a basis for comparing bidders. Agencies have broad discretion to set subfactors for each procurement.

Past-performance evaluation factor

Past performance is a mandatory evaluation factor, and agencies must include it in every procurement that exceeds the value of the simplified acquisition threshold, unless the contracting officer specifically excludes it. The agency describes its approach to evaluating past performance and usually requires bidders to provide past-performance contract summaries for relevant contracts of similar size, scope and complexity. Past-performance selection criteria can be defined broadly or narrowly. For example, past-performance contract references might be restricted to contracts performed or completed in the past three years. Narrow definitions can eliminate some excellent contracts from being presented as past-performance examples.

Full article by Bob Lohfeld, Washignton Technology

Unlike paid subscriptions services any business or contractor can now find thousands of open bids by keyword, state or expiration.

Get your free account to save complicated search queries, get bid alerts, monitor current open bids, and view RSS feeds.

Latest open state bids