GSA taking measured approach to SEWP takeover
Gettyimages.com/ Douglas Rissing
By
Nick Wakeman
Continuity is the General Services Administration's top priority as it embeds staff in NASA’s SEWP office to lay groundwork to transfer the $60 billion IT vehicle.
The General Services Administration still plans to take over NASA’s SEWP IT contract vehicle, but is taking a slow and steady approach.
“Continuity is my number one priority,” Laura Stanton, acting commissioner of GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service, told WT on Wednesday after she spoke at the GovExec-produced SAP NOW event in Washington, D.C.
GSA has people embedded with the SEWP office to understand processes and help determine the timing of when the contract moves to GSA, she said.
On Tuesday, NASA announced 2,100 awards across three functional areas. The bulk of the awards came in Category 3 for standalone services, a new business area for SEWP.
GSA wants to be careful with the transition because it does not want to disrupt the agencies that rely on SEWP and the vendors who have done billions of dollars of business through the vehicle, Stanton said.
NASA no longer has the official “delegation of procurement authority” needed to operate a government-wide acquisition contract. NASA, the National Institute of Health, and GSA were the only agencies with the authority.
But GSA is the only agency with that authority now.
NIH is letting its CIO-SP vehicles run out. Task orders can be awarded through October, but the period of performance must end by Dec. 31, 2028
NASA’s SEWP VI has a $60 billion ceiling over a 10-year period.
The move to consolidate government-wide contracts is part of the Trump administration’s initiative to centralize how agencies buy common goods and services through GSA.