Smart CHESS Moves

Written by Karen E. Thuermer

MIT 2010 Volume: 14 Issue: 2 (March)

Army Hardware, Software and Services Buying
Program has Saved Customers Vast Amounts
Over the Years Through Access to Volume Discounts.

The Computer Hardware, Enterprise Software and Solutions (CHESS) program, which is charged with fulfilling the Army’s COTS information technology requirements at the enterprise level, is holding a Consolidated Buy (CB) period through the end of March, with another period to follow this summer.

CHESS, which supports Army customers with hardware, services and software, has saved customers billions of dollars over the years through access to volume discounts, while also ensuring that what they buy represents the best technology available and complies with overall Army needs and policies. The CB period is held twice each fiscal year, from mid-January until the end of March and again from mid-June until the end of September.

“The CB affords an opportunity for the smallest organization, even an ‘Army of One,’ to take advantage of its membership in the Army enterprise and receive the same low unit price that the largest Army purchaser receives,” said Earle Mundell, an employee and contracting officer’s representative for PM General Fund Enterprise Business System within the Program Executive Office Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS).

The product will be state of the art, loaded with the latest version of the Army standard software, and comply with federal, Department of Defense and NETCOM 9th SC(A) standards. It will be delivered within a month and will include a three-year warranty at no additional cost. Procurement is streamlined through online ordering on the IT e-mart Website.

Use of the CB further supports the Army’s information assurance and asset management objectives, and complies with Army policy, Mundell said. “Using the CB is the right thing to do.”

During a CB period, the products and prices are posted on the CHESS Website, making it easy for contracting officers to perform their best value analyses. Contracting officers may then place CB orders (credit card and/or delivery orders) with the ADMC-2 contractor, using either IT e-mart to place credit card orders or their contract writing system to award a delivery order.

PRIMARY SOURCE

The CHESS mission is to be the Army’s primary source to support warfighter information dominance objectives by developing, implementing and managing IT contracts that provide enterprisewide net-centric hardware, software and support services.

“CHESS works diligently with other Army Knowledge Management partners, including the Army CIO/G6, NETCOM/9th Signal Command (Army), and the Army Contracting Command’s National Capital Region Contracting Center (NCRCC) to provide architecturally sound, standards and policy compliant IT enterprise solutions to Army customers around the world,” reported Mundell.

While the acronym CHESS was introduced in 2007 to more accurately reflect the range of products and services provided, the program office at Fort Monmouth, N.J., has been in existence since 1986. Then known as the Army Small Computer Program (ASCP), it was established to satisfy requirements for the fledgling technology of personal computers at a time when the Army was buying large main frames and contracting with industry to build computer systems based on military specifications.

With the passage of the Clinger- Cohen Act in 1996, the Army began complying with the mandate to utilize commercial specifications whenever possible, and ASCP began a steady growth to its current role as the Army’s designated primary source for COTS IT.

“That designation, contained in Army Regulation 25-1, ‘Knowledge Management and Information Technology,’ as well as numerous policy directives, requires that customers attempt to satisfy their COTS IT requirements utilizing CHESS absent a waiver,” explained Mundell. “Waivers are granted for mission- critical requirements not available through CHESS, and when host-country agreements preclude use of CHESS contracts.”

As part of its mission to supply COTS computers, ASCP also developed the Army’s first enterprise software agreement with Microsoft in 1995. In 1998, the DoD chief information officer established the Enterprise Software Initiative (ESI) to leverage departmental buying power, and the Army CIO/G-6 designated ASCP as the Army’s software product manager and representative to the ESI.

“ASCP/CHESS has since awarded 33 enterprise license agreements with cost avoidance of $4.1 billion since program inception,” Mundell reported.

Many of these are consolidations of multiple smaller license agreements, which resulted in reduced pricing for both the licenses and the associated software maintenance.

COST AVOIDANCE

Since its creation, the CHESS program has been extremely successful. Sales and associated cost avoidance (CA) have increased every year. The CB of desktops and notebooks, introduced in 2005, has proved extremely popular, producing CA in excess of $231 million over its four-year lifespan.

“That CA is ‘hard’ in that it reflects the reduced price of items actually ordered and delivered to customers,” Mundell commented. “Partially as a result of the Army’s increased focus on enterprise level solutions, sales across all CHESS programs have increased over 300 percent in the last three years.”

During CB 9, which ran from June through September 2009, for example, CHESS conducted a training session for an Army National Guard Bureau (NGB) official with responsibility for several NGB units/organizations. As a result of the briefing, the official directed all of the units to utilize the CB. During CB-9 the NGB purchased 2,779 desktops and 3,654 notebooks, realizing cost avoidance of $1.6 million.

Contracting officers in the Army derive a number of benefits from CHESS. First and foremost, it is a “force multiplier” for today’s contracting officers, who can leverage the pre-award actions already completed by CHESS’ designated contracting activity, NCRCC.

“CHESS contracts are multipleaward, indefinite-delivery/indefinitequantity (IDIQ) type contracts that were awarded by the NCRCC utilizing full and open competition, and are decentralized for ordering by any Army contracting activity,” Mundell explained.

Almost all of the steps required to award a delivery order have already been completed by NCRCC, including market research, solicitation and source selection, including negotiation of terms and conditions, and award of the basic contract.

In the case of the CB, the fair opportunity analysis required by FAR Part 16 for IDIQ contracts has also been completed. A contracting officer could literally receive a customer’s requirements package including COTS specification for a desktop or notebook, check the CB comparison chart posted on IT e-mart, and award to the lowest priced technically acceptable vendor.

“For more complex procurements for those customers seeking a best-value solution, the contracting officer may still utilize the pre-competed CHESS contracts and IT e-mart to conduct fair opportunity analyses, or issue requests for quotations and/or proposals for their delivery and task orders, saving considerable steps and time in the acquisition process,” Mundell said.

The pre-award ordering process for software is similarly streamlined by the NCRCC’s award of blanket purchase agreements against the General Services Administration (GSA) schedule.

“These awards comply with DoD and Army policy requiring the use of the DoD ESI and the GSA SmartBuy program, and reflect the unique expertise of NCRCC and CHESS in negotiating licensing terms and conditions, including transferability and net-centricity that are not widely practiced outside the IT contracting community,” he said.

Finally, the CHESS web portal provides numerous resources, including contract details, product information, points of contact, waiver request information, the latest DoD and Army policies on contracting for IT, and a listing of upcoming CHESS training and exhibiting venues.

“IT e-mart should be the first place Army contracting officers look to meet their customers’ information technology needs,” Mundell remarked.

CONTINUOUS COMPETITION

For Army customers, CHESS offers the optimal source for meeting cost, schedule and performance objectives, because CHESS prices have consistently been determined the lowest available for Army customers.

“In addition to the demonstrated cost savings, the continuous competition for orders on CHESS contracts results in the continuous availability of state-of-theart products from virtually every manufacturer in the commercial market,” Mundell added. “CHESS contracts are catalog-based, meaning that new products developed by the original equipment manufacturers are available to CHESS customers as soon as they become available to the general public, as opposed to other contract sources for COTS IT, which have been competed once and remain stable for the life of the contract or require time-consuming engineering change proposals to update.”

CHESS functions as a “distribution point” for NETCOM 9th SC(A), so its products are compliant with the latest standards, with no requirement for the customer to write them into their acquisition requirements packages before submitting to a contracting officer.

All CHESS desktops and notebooks come pre-loaded with the Army Golden Master, a software product that contains the Army’s standard desktop/laptop baseline configuration, which ensures compliance with the mandated Federal Desktop Core Configuration (FDCC). “Army organizations procuring through CHESS do not have to make any modifications to their systems,” Mundell explained.

For example, CHESS products were Microsoft Vista compliant for several years before December 2009, when all systems were required to be compliant. “Consequently, customers who had purchased their products through CHESS were automatically compliant with the FDCC and Vista mandate, while others were required to obtain waivers and/ or purchase new equipment to achieve compliance,” he said.

Customers may also customize their orders. Standard delivery on CHESS contracts is no later than 30 days after award, and vendors frequently negotiate shorter, longer and/or staggered deliveries as requested. Product pricing includes a standard commercial threeyear warranty providing on-site and/ or mail-back service for CONUS and OCONUS.

“Even in remote OCONUS locations, including Iraq and Afghanistan, warranty service is provided with a slightly longer response time,” Mundell said. “CHESS contracts are extremely flexible, and prices, delivery and warranty are all subject to negotiation when other than standard offerings are desired.” Finally, the customer pays no CHESS fee for use of the program and/or contracts.

LIFE CYCLE MANAGEMENT

One major benefit to customers is the fact CHESS has almost 25 years of experience in satisfying Army IT requirements. “This adds tremendous value to the Army enterprise by making available contract vehicles that offer state-of-theart products that meet DoD, Army and NETCOM 9th SC(A) standards and specifications with the lowest prices available,” Mundell emphasized. “Also, the CHESS vehicles provide favorable terms and conditions for supportability and sustainability across the enterprise.”

CHESS product leaders provide life cycle management from the development of contract specifications with NETCOM 9th SC(A) and the CIO/G-6, to the evaluation of proposals during the source selection process, through postaward technology refresh. Each phase of this support requires their continuous review of changing federal/DoD/Army policies and directives, as well as continuous collaboration with industry to ensure upcoming technology changes and trends are implemented in CHESS requirements planning, and are advertised to CHESS customers on IT e-mart.

“The synergy between CHESS hardware and software teams reduces rework and saves individual customers the effort of drafting and negotiating redundant requirements packages, as customers are provided the latest information on upcoming software releases when planning their hardware purchases,” he added. “The product leaders also conduct interviews with customers on current contracts to negotiate better solutions, solve problems, and work towards meeting all Army missions on time and within budget.”

Findings from this interaction have led to the offering of various customer tools, such as a CB user’s guide and CB compare tool, and the posting of the Information Assurance Approved Products list on the CHESS Website. CHESS product leaders are also active participants at events such as the Army LandWarNet and Software Systems Technology Conference, CHESS/USAREUR IT Technology Exchange, C4ISR Symposium, Army Microsoft Symposium and specialized IT seminars, not only to exchange information about Army IT requirements and industry trends, but also to address customer interests and answer contracting questions.

Overall, CHESS offers many different services to its customers through personal contact, through its customer service desk and via its Website, the IT e-mart electronic e-commerce ordering system. Customers may search, browse and compare CHESS product offerings, request quotes from vendors, and order IT products and services from their computers via the Internet.

Products are added to the CHESS CB as customer requirements are identified. Officials review trends in Army customer requirements/ordering and technology to determine the categories of platforms put on the CB.

The workstation category was introduced on CB-10 after assessing Army requirements, contractor sales of workstations and the potential additional cost avoidance to the Army. The workstation is intended to address the requirements of power users performing functions such as multi-media editing, computer-aided design, engineering functions, modeling and simulation, or other applications requiring the use of multiple concurrent threads. ♦

Back to Top