You’ve Decided to Sell Your Business— How to Be Prepared to Execute the Deal
After years of building, growing, and investing in your business, there comes a point at which you start to think about an exit strategy. Perhaps your exit will be transitioning the ownership of your business to a family member or selling the majority of your ownership interest to an investor and taking a back seat going forward, or maybe it’s selling the whole business enterprise. Regardless of the type of exit you contemplate, selling a business is not for the . . . Read More
New Receipts Calculation for Federal Contractors?
Congress is considering changing the receipts calculation for small businesses. Currently, a company’s size is determined based on the average annual receipts of the three recently completed fiscal years. However, in the Small Business Runway Extension Act of 2018, H.R. 6330, which the House passed on September 25, 2018, the House of Representatives proposes amending the Small Business Act to change this time period to five years. In a Report dated September 12, 2018, the House Small Business Committee (“HSBC”) observed that the . . . Read More
The Weekly Update for September 7, 2018
SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION Boosting small business demands big ideas According to an article in dcma.mil, there are 28 million small businesses in America, and Defense Contract Management Agency’s small business team wants as many of them as possible to join the defense industrial base. “Our mission is to provide small business support to our defense and government customers by ensuring subcontracting compliance and optimizing subcontracting opportunities,” said Tatia Evelyn-Bellamy, the director of DCMA’s Small Business Office and Small Business Compliance . . . Read More
Megan Connor was recently quoted in Bloomberg Government Federal Contracts Report article, “GAO to Pentagon: Not So Fast With Your Cloud Services Award.”
Megan Connor was recently quoted in Bloomberg Government Federal Contracts Report in an article discussing GAO’s decision that DOD overstepped its other transaction authority in making a $950 million award to REAN Cloud LLC, based on a protest filed by Oracle Corp. Ms. Connor stated that GAO “simply applied the plain language of the other transaction authority statute to find the Army did not comply.” Further she stated, “[f]rankly, I’m surprised the Army didn’t take corrective action to avoid a . . . Read More
The Weekly Update for May 4, 2018
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement: Amendments Related to Sources of Electronic Parts The Department of Defense (DoD) is issuing a final rule amending the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement to implement a section of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016 that makes contractors and subcontractors subject to approval (as well as review and audit) by appropriate DoD officials when identifying a contractor-approved supplier of electronic parts. 83 Fed. Reg. 87, 19641-2. Defense Federal Acquisition . . . Read More
Other Transaction Authority: What Is It and How Can I Get It?
If you followed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 (“FY 2018 NDAA”) or the recent cloud computing award to REAN Cloud, you likely heard the term “other transaction authority,” but may have wondered what it means. The term is an invention of lawmakers to give the U.S. Department of Defense (“DOD”) maximum flexibility in obtaining innovation without the trappings of traditional procurements. Contractors looking to take advantage of “other transaction authority” or “OTA” need to know some . . . Read More
SBA’s Office of Hearings and Appeals Clarifies the (Not So Obvious) Effect of Size and Status Recertifications
In a recent case with wide-ranging implications, the Small Business Administration’s (“SBA”) Office of Hearings and Appeals (“OHA”) confirmed the broad nature of SBA’s general rule that a contractor maintains its size and socio-economic status for the life of a contract. See In the Matter of Analytic Strategies, Inc., SBA No. VET-268 (Jan. 29, 2018). As a quick primer, SBA regulations provide that, where a concern represented itself and qualified as small and/or for a certain socio-economic status (e.g., SDVOSB, . . . Read More
Why Failing To Intervene In A Bid Protest Could Have Dire Consequences
Imagine that your company has just been awarded a contract after spending significant time and resources identifying a federal business opportunity and developing a winning proposal. Now imagine that just as you are preparing to perform that contract a bid protest is filed by an interested party (e.g., a disappointed competitor). Depending on the facts of the case, you may be inclined to sit back and let the protest play out. No doubt, such a tactic would save the company . . . Read More
The Importance of a Carefully Drafted Work Share Provision
Subcontracts contain a number of important provisions that shape the relationship between a prime and its subcontractor. However, there is one that overshadows the rest in terms of its significance to the parties’ agreement: work share. The work share provision dictates the amount and types of work the subcontractor will perform. In addition, it is through the work share provision that the parties decide how best to divide the work between themselves to achieve the agency’s objective. Given its importance . . . Read More
House Proposes Broader Application of “VA Rule of Two” to Close Kingdomware Loophole
On June 6, 2017, a bipartisan pair of lawmakers introduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, H.R. 2781, known as the Ensuring Veteran Enterprise Participation in Strategic Sourcing Act (“Bill”), which, if passed, would have a significant impact on how the Department of Veterans Affairs (“VA”) administers the Veterans First Contracting Program (“Vets First”) and specifically—the “Rule of Two.” As a brief background, the “Rule of Two” requires the VA to set aside procurements for veteran-owned small businesses . . . Read More