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Good Morning. The last day on which agencies can grant new contracts via CIO-SP3, CIO-SP3 Small Business or CIO-CS is October 29, leaving 44 days. Contractors who have active NITAAC opportunities should find out which contracts are still capable of clearing and where the rest of the pipeline will go.
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🎯 THE SIGNAL
The Health and Human Services department has instructed all three of the NITAAC governmentwide acquisition contracts to expire on October 29. The announcement of this decision was made by NITAAC on June 9 after it had carried out a review in connection with Executive Order 14240 and OMB memorandum M-25-31.
The last date for granting a new order is October 29; any order granted on or after June 8 must be completed by December 31, 2028, this applies to options as well. Agencies will also have until the end of 2028 to retrieve their order files from e-GOS. After that date, HHS and NIH will stop carrying out all remaining NITAAC functions, covering fee collection and the administration of assisted orders.
The notice ends by expressing its gratitude to the contract holders for their partnership between 2012 and 2026.
The vehicle that was meant to be provided was the CIO-SP4. A ten-year, $50 billion request was issued in May 2021 and resulted in 350 protest submissions in fiscal year 2023 alone. NITAAC cancelled the initiative in January without making an award. The reason given for the cancellation was Executive Order 14240 and OMB memorandum M-25-31, both of which call for the use of GSA to carry out more common procurement.
There is no single alternative; HHS says that the future requirements will be handled via the existing GSA vehicles and other sources from agencies. For the majority of contractors, the transition will revolve around Alliant 3, OASIS+, SEWP VI, and MAS.
The vehicles are not all equally ready. Alliant 3 has named 43 out of the 76 that were planned for Phase 1. SEWP VI is due to start on November 1, which is three days after the NITAAC ordering window ends. In June, NASA gave 2,115 SEWP VI contracts to 1,490 vendors, and SEWP V is expected to keep accepting orders until January 31.
OASIS+ switched to a continuously open model in January.
OASIS+ merits a more detailed examination. Although Phase II increased the number of domains from eight to thirteen, existing holders were not automatically assigned to the five new domains. It is possible for a contractor to have OASIS+ and yet to have no access to the domain needed for a displaced NITAAC opportunity.
Make sure you verify the domain before informing a customer that you can take on the work.
NITAAC sunset countdown. NITAAC GWACs stop accepting new orders on October 29, 2026, 44 days out. Where the work lands: Alliant 3 has named 43 of 76 planned Phase 1 awardees. SEWP VI opens November 1, three days after NITAAC closes, with SEWP V ordering until January 31, 2027. OASIS+ is continuously open, but five Phase II domains are not automatic for existing holders. GSA MAS is open now.
The same problem applies to the agencies. If a program office is planning an IT requirement for fiscal year 2027 through CIO-SP3, it must award the contract by October 29 or else select a different acquisition route.
Development | What It Means for You |
|---|---|
October 29 is the final day to award a NITAAC order | Review the pipeline now. Anything unlikely to clear by the deadline needs another acquisition path. |
Orders awarded since June 8 must end by December 31, 2028 | Check the period of performance, including options, on every order awarded this summer. |
Future requirements may move to GSA or other agency vehicles | Confirm which vehicles and contract teams you can actually access. |
OASIS+ Phase II domains were not automatic | Verify the domain before briefing a customer or positioning for displaced work. |
Three well-established IT companies close their ordering periods within 44 days. The work will not be passed on to a single successor, and any contractors who do not identify an alternative route until October will be late.
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💰MONEY MOVES
General Electric has been given a contract worth $2.87 billion, which is not to exceed, for performance-based logistics relating to 17 F414 engine components used on the Navy's F/A-18E/F and EA-18G aircraft. The contract includes a five-year base period, and the work will be carried out in Lynn, Massachusetts, and Jacksonville, Florida.
Ernst & Young secured a contract worth $990 million for agency-wide financial statement audits for the Department of War Inspector General covering the period up to fiscal 2031. The request for quotation received only one submission.
Accenture Federal Services has been awarded a contract worth $480.4 million on a firm-fixed-price basis to construct the Joint Enterprise Task Management System, which will be used to replace the existing tasking and correspondence systems throughout the department.
The Cherokee Nation Government Solutions, in association with SSE BB&E JV and KIRA Services, have agreed to share a $400 million multiple-award IDIQ for civil engineering work in the Pacific theater.
📡OPPORTUNITY RADAR
OASIS+ Phase II access — GSA
The situation was that five additional domains were included in Phase II, which increased the number of domains in OASIS+ from eight to thirteen, and existing holders were not automatically enrolled in them.
Who ought to be concerned: NITAAC holders who are working through OASIS+ to obtain displaced services, in particular those firms which have an existing seat but do not check domain access.
The action to take is to match each current NITAAC opportunity with the corresponding OASIS+ domain. If you do not have it, then you should identify a colleague who does so before the customer starts searching for an alternative route.
SEWP VI go-live — NASA
The situation is that SEWP VI is expected to start on November 1 with a $20 billion limit per category and a performance period extending to October 2036; NASA also plans to keep SEWP V open until January 31, 2027.
Who ought to be concerned: IT resellers, original equipment manufacturers and integrators, especially those experiencing the loss of NITAAC access during the same quarter.
If you have received a SEWP VI award, then you must complete your onboarding by November 1; if you haven't received one, SEWP V offers a brief transition period, and after January you will need another prime, vehicle, or channel strategy.
🧭PEOPLE & POSTURE
DRPM-UxS still has no officially named director since the office completed its eleventh week; DRPM, the Navy's parallel robotics and autonomous systems program, does have one, with Christopher Miller acting under William Toti.
The report from the CMMC Reform Task Force was received by the CIO of the Department of War at the end of last week but has not yet been issued. The RFI received more than 1,100 responses amounting to over 10,000 pages, and over half of the respondents favored putting assessments on hold. That pause was made binding by a class deviation of September 3, which instructed contracting officers to remove the requirement for third-party assessments from contracts.
📊READER PULSE
This issue's question. One tap. Anonymous. Results Thursday.
How much revenue do you have riding on a NITAAC vehicle?
🔮PREDICTIONS
We called it (on August 27). We had stated that there would be no lapse in appropriations on October 1. On September 1 the House considered the date proposed by the Senate on December 11 and approved it by a vote of 370 to 48. The President signed it the next day. The deadline for October has now been settled, making the total number of decisions 3-1.
The more difficult struggle would surely be in December, since the temporary measure expires on December 11, after the midterms and during a lame-duck session which might be operating under a different balance of power.
It remains open. More than one design progresses from the concept refinement stage in CCA Increment 2 on to prototyping. The date for this is September 1. It will be considered resolved when the prototyping awards are awarded next year.
A new call has been made today, stating that at least one GSA vehicle will publicly announce an on-ramp, an expansion of the scope, or an accelerated award schedule linked to the NITAAC transition before December 31.
The GSA has already stated that it is preparing for the migration; agencies that lose NITAAC will need an alternative means of meeting the FY2027 requirements, since several vehicles are capable of taking on the work. A full quarter with no GSA action publicly linked to the sunset grades would be considered a miss.
⭐TIP OF THE SPEAR PRO
It is not a requirement under the present continuing resolution that an agency should cease from transferring an existing requirement from NITAAC to a GSA vehicle; rather, such a transition is normally considered different from initiating a completely new program under Section 102.
It is important to note this distinction; if a contracting officer assumes that the CR prevents all transitions, it could cause work which is still capable of proceeding to be delayed. Contractors must be prepared to demonstrate whether the requirement applies to ongoing work or establishes a new activity.
Members who are upgraded have access to the entire CR guide, which includes the anomaly process and the situation that arises when a source selection moves into the new fiscal year.
THE LAST WORD
The notice from NITAAC was issued on June 9, during the time when the acquisition community was engaged in working through the FAR rewrite, and it didn't attract the amount of attention that normally follows the closure of a major ordering channel.
It is possible that some contractors find out about the deadline only later, perhaps through a contracting officer who is no longer in a position to award the order as originally intended.
If you hold a NITAAC seat, I want to know when you heard about the sunset. Did a program office contact you, or did you find the notice yourself? Hit reply. I will keep your response anonymous.
Semper Fi,
— Justin