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FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF SEPTEMBER 07, 2017 FBO #5767
DOCUMENT

70 -- TAC-17-45483 Vertical - Mobile App - Mental Health - Attachment

Notice Date

9/5/2017
 

Notice Type

Attachment
 

NAICS

541512 — Computer Systems Design Services
 

Contracting Office

Department of Veterans Affairs;Technology Acquisition Center;23 Christopher Way;Eatontown NJ 07724
 

ZIP Code

07724
 

Solicitation Number

VA11817Q2463
 

Response Due

8/30/2017
 

Archive Date

10/31/2017
 

Point of Contact

Jessica Adamitis
 

E-Mail Address

0-9704<br
 

Small Business Set-Aside

N/A
 

Award Number

VA118-17-C-2307
 

Award Date

9/1/2017
 

Awardee

VERTICAL DESIGN LLC;1219 DERBY ST;BERKELEY;CA;94702
 

Award Amount

$780,500.00
 

Description

Mental Health Mobile Apps Design, Control Number: TAC-17-45483 Development, and Research Support 5 of 7 Mental Health Mobile Apps Design, Control Number: TAC-17-45483 Development, and Research Support JUSTIFICATION FOR OTHER THAN FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION 1. Contracting Activity: Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Acquisition Operations Technology Acquisition Center 23 Christopher Way Eatontown, NJ 07724 2. Description of Action: The proposed action is for a firm-fixed price (FFP) contract with Vertical Design, LLC (Vertical) for continued support services of National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Dissemination and Training Division (NCPTSD) mobile applications (apps), the porting of two existing mobile apps to mobile Operating Systems (OS), and the development of two research version mobile apps for mobile OS. 3. Description of Supplies or Services: VA NCPTSD is responsible for creating training and educational products to support evidence-based care of Veterans with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and related problems, which can have a significant impact of on Veterans quality of life. Most Veterans with PTSD do not access evidence-based treatments or mental health services, due to a lack of available services, distance from clinics, or the stigma associated with mental health care. Therefore, NCPTSD has developed mobile apps to overcome such barriers to care. The apps are designed to assist Veterans and their family members with understanding PTSD and related problems, tracking Veteran improvement over time, obtaining support and resources, and managing symptoms using a variety of brief relaxation/stress coping tools. NCPTSD has a portfolio of 23 mobile apps including PTSD Coach, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBTi) Coach, Mindfulness Coach, Couples Coach, Exposure Coach, and Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE) Coach. These mobile apps run on iOS and Android OS and are capable of collecting (anonymized) usage data including session start time, stop time, duration, use of each major feature of the app, as well as user actions such as button presses, survey responses, and selected options. This usage data is primarily used by NCPTSD for a critical series of ongoing clinical care and research trials including: Mind-Stride, PTSD Coach +, Mindfulness, VetChange, CBTi, Couples Coach, and Primary Care (PC)-PTSD. Versions of the apps that do not collect usage data are also available for those users that would rather not share their usage data. The data collecting and non-data collecting versions of each mobile app are referred to as the research and public versions respectively. The Government awarded contract VA261-15-C-0144 to Vertical for the development of a cloud-hosted database Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and the development framework necessary to integrate mobile apps with the SaaS solution. The Vertical SaaS solution is hosted in the Amazon GovCloud, by Vertical, and provides a number of features/capabilities. The SaaS and development framework facilitate the capture, transmission, storage, and analysis of usage data for multiple ongoing VA research studies. The SaaS consists of multiple databases used to store the usage data from hundreds of Veteran users for analysis, and includes a server component that provides a secure web-based and command-line interface. Both interfaces allow NCPTSD researchers to generate invitation codes. An invitation code is sent to a Veteran that has volunteered to take part in user experience testing. The Veteran downloads and installs the research version of the mobile app from Google Play or the Apple App Store, depending on the brand of smartphone. The Veteran then uses the invitation code to activate the mobile app. Once the mobile app is activated, the app leverages the Vertical developed framework to periodically structure and securely send usage data to the SaaS. The Vertical developed development framework is used to capture and securely send usage data from the app to the secure server. VA researchers then use either the SaaS web-based interface or command line tool to securely query the data and perform analysis. The command line interface is also used to integrate VA systems/applications with the SaaS, thereby allowing the VA system/applications to pull data directly from the SaaS without requiring manual intervention. Vertical currently maintains their developed SaaS solution and development framework, which supports all research version mobile apps. The SaaS solution currently contains and is actively collecting usage data from hundreds of Veterans. VA NCPTSD requires the continuation support services of NCPTSD, which includes hosting, maintenance, and support of the Vertical developed SaaS solution, maintenance of the existing portfolio of mobile apps, and the continued integration of mobile apps with the SaaS solution. The maintenance and integration services ensures ongoing and accurate collection, storage and transmission of data under ideal and non-ideal use scenarios (e.g., infrequent wifi/cell service), responsiveness to changes in VA NCPTSD data requirements, and updates to research-enabled mobile applications to reflect public release versions. VA NCPTSD also requires the porting of two existing mobile apps to OS, CBTi Coach and Mindfulness Coach, to the respective other OS, Android or iOS, the development of two research version mobile apps, Couples Coach and Exposure Coach, and integration of these mobile apps into the Vertical SaaS solution as part of the support services. These efforts will allow NCPTSD to continue data capture for ongoing clinical trials and user experience studies, expand NCPTSD s capability of delivering innovative, data-enabled interventions for PTSD, and increase the number of Veterans who can access these mobile applications from their personal devices. The period of performance shall include a 12-month base period and two 12-month option periods for continued support services. Optional tasks are included to allow for enhancements of existing mobile apps to validate invitation codes and securely send usage data to the SaaS and to develop new research-enabled mobile apps. In addition, optional tasks are included for maintenance services in support of new mobile apps. The total estimated value of the proposed action, including options, is $2,982,772.00. 4. Statutory Authority: The statutory authority permitting other than full and open competition is 41 U.S.C. 3304(a)(1) as implemented by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Subpart 6.302-1 entitled, Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements. 5. Rationale Supporting Use of Authority Cited Above: The proposed source for this action is Vertical, 1219 Derby Street, Berkeley, CA 94702. Only Vertical can provide the required services, as it owns the proprietary rights to the cloud-hosted SaaS solution and the development framework necessary to provide the required support services to the mobile apps that exist within the SaaS solution. As part of its SaaS solution, Vertical developed a proprietary format for data transfer and storage of the research mobile apps. All VA NCPTSD mobile apps must be able to integrate and communicate within the existing Vertical SaaS solution and development framework in order to seamlessly capture, transmit, and store usage data. Due to proprietary nature of the SaaS software code, no other vendor has access to Vertical s proprietary source code and are therefore, unable to provide the required support services to the SaaS solution and the mobile apps integration with the SaaS solution. The source code is required to ensure the continued support services, hosting, maintenance, and integration services are properly configured and updates can be developed and deployed into the SaaS solution and fielded apps. Without the source code, it will be impossible to gain access to the coded structure, which is required to push the updates/upgrades to the Vertical SaaS solution and maintained mobile apps. Only Vertical can provide the required services necessary to port two existing mobile apps, CBTi Coach and Mindfulness Coach, to the respective other operating system, Android or iOS, and the develop two research version mobile apps, Couples Coach and Exposure Coach, as integration of these applications into the Vertical developed SaaS solution requires access to Vertical s proprietary source code. As new research mobile apps are developed or ported to the other OS, they must be designed and implemented specifically to be able to seamlessly integrate and be fully compatible with the Vertical SaaS solution. Vertical s developmental framework is proprietary in nature and is integrated into each research mobile app in order to facilitate the capture, transmission, storage, and analysis of usage data for multiple ongoing VA research studies. In addition, each mobile app is further developed in order to capture specific usage data that is unique to the specific app. Without access to Vertical s proprietary source code to the SaaS and developmental framework, these applications could not be ported or developed to integrate within the Vertical SaaS solution. Furthermore, Vertical s proprietary source code is not available for sale. VA requires uninterrupted access to all mobile app usage data, which is inclusive of all current, actively, and future collected data, by the Vertical SaaS solution. Any interruption to data access or the continued collection of usage data would severely impact a critical series of ongoing clinical care and research trials including: Mind-Stride, PTSD Coach +, Mindfulness, VetChange, CBTi, Couples Coach, and Primary Care (PC)-PTSD. These trials and the supporting NCPTSD mobile apps are essential to provide reliable, high-quality mental health service to Veterans, their families, and health care providers. The use of another source would cause detrimental delay and downtime to these critical clinical care and research trials. Failure to continue the support services of the Vertical SaaS solution and fielded mobile apps would cause NCPTSD to lose access to all usage data collected by the Vertical SaaS. Furthermore usage data collection from the fielded mobile apps utilized by these trials would cease. This would significantly impact several funded trials, which rely on the data collected from these mobile apps for clinical analysis. Break in data collection would cause the inability to meet the aggressive milestones set for these research trials could result in termination of one or more trials. This would result in substantial harm to individual Veterans who are actively engaged in trials and clinical services designed to reduce symptoms of PTSD, who would no longer have access to these research-enabled applications or be able to contribute to the larger body of knowledge on how to best treat PTSD using mobile applications. Loss of these services would effectively disable the connection between Veterans use of these research-enabled PTSD applications and the providers and researchers who are monitoring this use to better inform PTSD treatment. Additionally, the source code to the SaaS solution is unique and proprietary to Vertical. The use of another source would require a thorough analysis of the data coding, scripts, and relationships and intercommunications between the data itself, the mobile apps, and interfaces as to how the current framework and processes of the mobile apps and its data could translate and be compatible within a new solution. Such analysis would need to be to a specific solution as each solution would include its own proprietary code and have unique translation requirements. Transference to a new solution would then require a complete extraction of all data from the Vertical solution, which must be extracted in a manner that is transferable to another system and would not lose developed data relationships, a process that is not guaranteed to ensure all data would be transferable. This effort could not be performed without assistance from Vertical as such analysis and transference of data from their developed SaaS solution would require access and knowledge of Vertical s proprietary software code and how data integrations with the SaaS solution. All currently fielded research mobile apps would need to be rebuilt, as any new solution would have its own proprietary coded solution in which the apps would need to be built to specifically integrate with. Based upon historical data and effort of the NCPTSD to obtain a research application infrastructure with all mobile apps fully integrated and maintained, the use of a new solution could result in a duplication of effort of at least three years. 6. Efforts to Obtain Competition: Market research was conducted, details of which are in the market research section of this document. This effort did not yield any additional sources that can meet the Government s requirements. There is no competition anticipated for this acquisition. Additionally, the proposed action will be synopsized on the Federal Business Opportunities Page in accordance with FAR 5.201. Any proposals that are received  shall be evaluated. 7. Actions to Increase Competition: The Government will continue to conduct market research to ascertain if there are changes in the market place that would enable future actions to be competed. 8. Market Research: Government NCPTSD technical experts have conducted continuous market research, as recently as June 2017, through extensive one on one contact with manufacturers and internet research regarding Vertical support services and mobile app services to determine if sources other than Vertical can satisfy the requirement. Specifically, the technical experts conducted direct communications with other mobile analytics and software development companies such as, Cloudmine, Medable, and Catalyze. While these other manufacturer solutions offer general capabilities to provide a SaaS solution, the NCPTSD technical experts determined that only Vertical has access to the proprietary data and source code necessary to continue the support services, and the porting of and development of mobile apps that can integrate into the Vertical developed SaaS solution. Communications with these manufacturer representatives confirmed that, in order to utilize either manufacturer solution, NCPTSD would have to overhaul the entire existing Vertical SaaS and replace it completely with the corresponding manufacturer s solution. These sources that were contacted all agreed with the Government s assessment. Data collected and stored by the Vertical SaaS solution was not guaranteed to be recovered by either manufacturer s solution. Furthermore, it was confirmed that all research mobile apps would have to be rebuilt in order to integrate with the new solution. This conclusion was determined by Government technical experts and concurred with by respective manufacturer representatives. Finally, Government representatives contacted Vertical to confirm the availability of resellers. Communications with Vertical confirmed that Vertical is the sole provider of the required services and has no authorized resellers. Furthermore, on July 19, 2017 Vertical confirmed that their SaaS solution was built upon proprietary code that is not made available to any other manufacturer. Vertical also confirmed on August 9, 2017 that their proprietary source code is not made available for sale. 9. Other Facts: None 10. Technical and Requirements Certification: I certify that the supporting data under my cognizance, which are included in this justification, are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief. Jason Owen Date: ________________________________ Program Manager Signature: ____________________________ 11. Fair and Reasonable Cost Determination: I hereby determine that the anticipated price to the Government for this contract action will be fair and reasonable. Price discounts will be sought. Additionally, the quotation will be compared to the Independent Government Cost Estimate. Juan Quinones Date: ________________________________ Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: ____________________________ 12. Procuring Contracting Officer Certification: I certify that this justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief. Juan Quinones Date: ________________________________ Procuring Contracting Officer Signature: ____________________________ Approval In my role as procuring activity Advocate for Competition, based on the foregoing justification, I hereby approve the acquisition of continued support services of NCPTSD, the porting of two existing mobile apps to mobile OS, and the development of two research version mobile apps for mobile OS, on an other than full and open competition basis pursuant to the statutory authority cited in paragraph 4 above, subject to availability of funds, and provided that the services herein described have otherwise been authorized for acquisition. Date: ____________ Signature: _________________________________ Ronald J. Bakay Advocate for Competition Technology Acquisition Center Office of Acquisition Operations
 

Web Link

FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/notices/6d3b870ca7cc2bffd557d9971c005bfc)
 

Document(s)

Attachment
 

File Name: VA118-17-C-2307 VA118-17-C-2307_1.docx (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=3775873&FileName=VA118-17-C-2307-000.docx)

Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=3775873&FileName=VA118-17-C-2307-000.docx

 

Note: If links are broken, refer to Point of Contact above or contact the FBO Help Desk at 877-472-3779.
 

Record

SN04662032-W 20170907/170905232252-6d3b870ca7cc2bffd557d9971c005bfc (fbodaily.com)
 

Source

FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
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