Notice of Intent to Sole-Source: Online recruitment platform for behavioral nutrition studies with adolescents and Spanish-speaking parents

THIS IS A NOTICE OF INTENT TO AWARD A SOLE SOURCE PURCHASE ORDER WITHOUT PROVIDING FOR FULL AND OPEN COMPETITION.  THIS IS NOT A SOLICITATION OR A REQUEST FOR COMPETITIVE PROPOSALS.

GENERAL

This notice is issued in accordance with Revolutionary FAR Overhaul (RFO) 12.201-1(c)(2), advertising the Government's intent to issue an award on a sole source basis under the authority established in RFO 12.102(a). The National Institutes of Health, Specialized Scientific Information Technology (SSIT) Division anticipates issuing a single Purchase Order (PO) to the following entity:

CLOUDRESEARCH LLC
7328 136TH ST
Flushing, New York
11367-2827, United States

BACKGROUND

Researchers within the Division of Population Health Research of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) require services from an online recruitment platform to support behavioral nutrition studies with adolescents and Spanish-speaking parents. The studies require recruiting participants from specific populations, including adolescents and Spanish-speaking parents of young children. These populations are difficult to recruit through many online recruitment platforms because the number of eligible Spanish-speaking parents of young children are typically insufficient to meet study enrollment requirements. The recruitment platform must be capable of providing sufficient numbers of participants from both populations to support the planned research studies.

This platform must meet the following requirements:

• The platform must be designed specifically to support research studies rather than general crowdsourcing activities for which research is only a secondary use.
• The platform must allow recruitment of sufficient numbers of adolescents and Spanish-speaking parents of young children to meet study enrollment requirements.
• The platform must support longitudinal research by enabling researchers to re-contact and re-recruit participants for follow-up surveys and assessments.
• The platform must support rapid recruitment of participants, including the ability to recruit hundreds of eligible participants within a relatively short timeframe.
• The platform must support collection of high-quality research data through participant screening, participant management, and data quality controls.
• The platform must facilitate routing to external, NIH websites and surveys.

Based on market research, only one source is available to furnish these services.

RESPONSES

There will not be a solicitation or competitive Request for Quotation (RFQ) issued as a result of this announcement. Any responses or inquiries to this notice must demonstrate clear and convincing evidence that competition will be advantageous to the Government. 

Notwithstanding the stated intent, if other organizations believe they can fully meet the Government’s requirement, they must submit written documentation of their capabilities. The capabilities statement must contain sufficient documentation to establish a bona fide capability to fulfill the requirement and must be received by the response date listed in this posting. A general statement which merely states the entity is capable will not be sufficient. A determination not to compete with this requirement, based upon responses to this notice, is solely within the discretion of the Government. 

NIH will not be responsible for any costs incurred by interested parties in responding to this notice. Acknowledgement of receipt of responses will not be made, nor will respondents be notified of the evaluation of the information received.  Interested parties may respond and provide a capability statement no later than the date specified in this notice.  Emails must reference the announcement number in the subject line.  This is not an RFQ, and this announcement does not commit the Government to award a contract.