The General Services Administration is soliciting input from industry as it plans to launch a follow-on acquisition for the Commercial Platforms program in accordance with a provision of the fiscal year 2018 National Defense Authorization Act, which seeks to create an initiative to enable federal agencies to buy commercial items through e-commerce portals.
GSA is seeking feedback on several requirements that may be included in future contracts under the Commercial Platforms program, including the availability of product catalogs, capability of platforms to access and process credit card transactions and provide GSA and agency buyers with data for analysis purposes, according to a request for information published Wednesday.
Other requirements are measures to protect government data and implement supplier data protections, cybersecurity, compliance with laws and directives and capability of platforms to meet minimum performance thresholds, including delivery times within two to five days and providing order visibility and tracking information.
The agency collected user experience feedback in the last 18 months through the implementation of the Commercial Platforms program’s proof of concept and is now seeking insights on commercial practices for key areas and information on the availability of certain features on existing online platforms.
These areas include onboarding/account management; market research; purchase; post-purchase; user management; workflow capabilities; data capabilities; and supply chain risk management capabilities.
In June 2020, GSA awarded contracts to Amazon Business, Fisher Scientific and Overstock.com (Nasdaq: OSTK) to implement an e-commerce portals proof-of-concept.
GSA will use insights from the RFI to support efforts in meeting an FY 2022 NDAA requirement, which calls for the program to start testing other commercial models.
Responses to the RFI are due April 15.
