Accenture’s complaints over $1.6B Transportation Command contract fall short
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By
Nick Wakeman
The Government Accountability Office denies Accenture Federal's claims of a conflict of interest at CACI International, whose technical proposal and a willingness to take a lower profit won out.
Accenture Federal Services’ arguments that CACI International had organizational conflicts of interest that rendered it ineligible for a $1.6 billion cloud services contract failed to carry much weight at the Government Accountability Office.
CACI won the potential 10-year contract in August to support the U.S. Transportation Command’s Joint Transportation Management System.
Following the award, Accenture Federal filed a protest that alleged two of CACI’s subcontractors had OCIs because of other work they did for Transcom.
One subcontractor held a financial services contract, and the second company provided analytical support for Transcom’s IT investment portfolio.
Accenture Federal argued that these contracts gave the CACI team unequal access to information, according to the GAO ruling unsealed Thursday.
But GAO found that any conflicts were already mitigated. In the case of one subcontractor, the information it had access to was included in the bidder’s library.
Transcom also already put in place mitigation measures for the for the second subcontractor that included segregation of duties, firewalls, non-disclosure agreements, and management oversight.
Accenture Federal also challenged how Transcom allowed CACI to reduce its pricing late in the proposal process.
Both companies had discussions about their proposals with Transcom to resolve deficiencies and pricing concerns.
“Relevant here, Accenture made no further revisions to its proposal, but CACI revised its cost/price proposal by reducing its proposed labor rates for certain order types,” GAO wrote.
CACI reduced the fees on those rates, and lowered its proposed profit and fee percentages on other orders.
Accenture Federal argued that Transcom should have reassessed CACI’s technical approach to verify that the new pricing was realistic.
But the agency argued that there was no technical impact because CACI did not change the underlying direct labor rates or professional compensation. CACI's willingness to make less profit did not undermine its technical proposal, according to the GAO decision.
Transcom picked CACI because of its strong technical proposal and the lowest price.
CACI has begun work on the contract with the protest decision in the rear view mirror, CEO John Mengucci told investors in January.
The contract is a new one and aims to re-engineer business process in the cloud around financial, transportation, and logistical operations.
Transcom wants software that supports various commercial transportation models that include asset-based carriers, third-party logistics providers and freight forwarders.
The software solution will support multiple modes of transportation operations to include air, ocean, freight, rail, and small package shipments.
Work will take place over an initial five-year base period, followed by a single option for five more years.