NATO Business Opportunity: Information Environment Assessment Capability (IEAC) Data Platform

The NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCIA) intends to issue an Invitation for Bid (IFB) for an Information Environment Assessment Capability (IEAC) Data Platform.

To bid on this project, potential U.S. prime contractors must 1) maintain a professionally active facility (office, factory, laboratory, etc.) within the United States, 2) be pre-approved for participation in NATO Competitive Procurement (NCP), 3) be issued a Declaration of Eligibility (DOE) by the Department of Commerce (DOC), and 4) register with NCIA’s eProcurement tool, Neo: https://www.ncia.nato.int/business/procurement/neo-eprocurement 

The reference for the IFB is IFB-424210-IEAC and all correspondence concerning the IFB should include this reference.

SUMMARY OF REQUIREMENT

NCIA is procuring for its Information Environment Assessment (IEA) community across the NATO Enterprise a modern data platform supporting the following core processes:

• Analytically enhanced data products and reports development.
• Collaboration, RFI management, tasking, coordination, and dissemination.
• Data enrichment, labelling and information management.
• Orchestration of NATO-procured commercial online data-services through web APIs.
• Indicators and warnings.

The platform must be compatible with the major cloud providers platforms, and will be installed and tested on the following NATO tenants:

• NATO UNCLASSIFIED intranet, hosted on the NATO Azure tenant: all functionalities, including the ability to leverage NATO-accredited AI services provided through the Platform’s MCP server and an OpenAI-compatible API.

• The NATO partners-facing extranet, hosted on the AWS NATO tenant: only collaboration, RFI management, coordination, and dissemination features.

• The NATO classified network, hosted on-premises: only collaboration, RFI management, coordination and dissemination features.

The contract will deliver:

• The procurement of the solution and its installation on all tenants.
• The connection to web APIs, and development of collaboration spaces and workflows.

The evaluation methodology will be Best Value, where the key selection factor will be openness and extensibility through the use of mainstream underlying platforms.

The overall implementation effort is expected not to exceed one year, followed by support.

BECOMING ELIGIBLE TO BID

NCP requires that the U.S. Government issue a DOE for potential U.S. prime contractors interested in this project. Before the U.S. Government can do so, however, the U.S. Government must approve the U.S. firm for participation in NCP.  U.S. firms are approved for NCP on a facility-by-facility basis. 

The U.S. NCP application is a one-time application.  The application requires supporting documentation in the form of 1) a company resume or capability statement indicating contracts completed as a prime contractor and 2) an annual report or set of financial documents indicating compilation, review, or audit by an independent CPA.

The U.S. Government continues to accept the legacy NATO International Competitive Bidding (ICB) application for participation in NCP. U.S. firms can download a copy of the legacy ICB application from the following website:

https://www.bis.gov/about-bis/bis-leadership-and-offices/SIES/business-opportunities-nato 

DOC is the U.S. Government agency that approves NCP applications. Please submit to the email address provided your application and supporting documentation (as attachments). If your firm is interested in a specific NCP project at this time, please also include the following in the TEXT of your email:

- the title and/or solicitation number of the project
- the name/phone/email of the company employee who should receive the bid documents

After approval of your one-time NCP application, DOC will then know to follow up by issuing a DOE for the project.  DOC will transmit the DOE to the NATO contracting agency.  

IMPORTANT DATES:

Request a DOE (and, for firms new to NCP, submit the one-time NCP application): 24 April 2026

NCIA distributes the IFB (planned): 30 April 2026

Bid closing (anticipated): 15 June 2026

Contract Award (estimated): 30 November 2026