The cap on fee in new contract from the LANL RFP is 1% fixed and 0.5% at risk. If LANL is at 2.5B per year, that translates to 25M fixed and 12.5M at risk, for a max of 37.5M. Considering just how messed up the place is, will be interesting to see what companies are willing to take on the job for this payment.
Also read that the winning team can be a university, consortium of universities, non-profit or not-for-profit institution. In all those cases, the NMGRT gravy train just comes to a screeching stop and the locals will have to return to living within their pre-LANS budgets
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In all those cases, the NMGRT gravy train just comes to a screeching stop and the locals will have to return to living within their pre-LANS budgets
Noooooooooooo, Noooooo, please God, Nooooooo!!!
All kidding aside the rumors are that current LANS and underlings are in utter shock about the wording. This is really hitting them hard.
All kidding aside the rumors are that current LANS and underlings are in utter shock about the wording. This is really hitting them hard.
July 14, 2017 at 7:18 PM
Yeah, reality sux.
It's gotta suck to sell your soul for such a pittance.
Well, think of the competition this way. Three evaluation criterion, one and two are equal in importance, let's use a total score of 100 (40, 40 and 20 respectively) for discussion purposes:
Criterion 1, Past performance, worth 40 points: LANS scores 20 points out of 40 (being generous)
Criterion 2, Key members: Let's say LANS proposes the same existing managers with a couple of changes (to propose an entirely new team would be akin to admitting the current team is incompetent, won't happen): LANS scores 20 points out of 40 (again being generous)
Criterion 3, small business: 20 points out of 20
Total score (out of a possible 100) = 60
Now you can understand why LANS management is in shock. There is no way that LANS will score in the 90 percentile, where the successful offer will rank.
And if after NNSA looks at LANS past performance and scores even lower, NNSA can readily determine, as stated in the RFP, just with criterion 1, that LANS cannot get to the competitive range and there is nothing that LANS can do to improve their scores, past performance is ahem in the past, then as stated in the RFP, the evaluation of LANS will stop with criterion 1 and LANS is out.
When a vendor clearly does not have a chance of being in the competitive range, procurement will not expend resources evaluating a clearly losing proposal.
In my opinion, LANS may not even compete since bid and proposal costs can easily be in the low to mid six figure range.
All scores are kept confidential and are business sensitive; however, when a vendor is eliminated early, it is not difficult to ascertain that the scores were low. LANS may not be able to take the humiliation and everyone in the senior team will suddenly discover they want to spend time with their families or want to return to research or engineering or teaching or creating a new circle somewhere else.
I keep hearing that Bechtel is going to go it alone and blame UC for all the problems. The idea is that Bechtel has so much influence in Congress and DC that they can simply force the decision to be in their favor. I am not sure what this means for the LANS people but my guess at least half of them are out under this version. So if this rumor is true LANS is now officially dead as Bechtel has dissolved it ties with UC.
The LANS scores were not low across all areas. The Science, Weapons and Global Security scores were high. The capital construction and operations scores have been the problem.
"The Science, Weapons and Global Security scores were high. "
The problem is how on earth do you judge this? Most people at LANL are in agreement that these areas have been greatly degraded since LANS took over, however it is not clear what the metric would be. Publications appear to be down, almost none of the prestigious postoc like the Oppenheimer etc have stayed since the contract change.
There has also been a number of senior people who have left. Some manager once said if half of all the science work disappeared overnight it would not make one dent in the
science score the labs gets.
July 16, 2017 at 7:31 AM
I have to agree with you, especially when looking at the official performance reports on M&O contractors posted on the NNSA website. The best shot for UC is to form an LLC with Battelle, and maybe add Honeywell as an "industrial" partner with its Sandia and Nevada site contract connections.
LANL has to have a science/research entity as part of the bid team, and if Bechtel grabs Battelle first, UC will have less of a chance.
A UC-Honeywell LLC vs a Bechtel-Battelle LLC showdown for LANL would give the NNSA selection board fits.
I hear UC may in fact be putting together something with maybe Honeywell. I know UNM is interested in being part of some kind of team. There was the rumor of Bechtel doing something without UC. I have also heard 12 different teams are interested. Seems like a lot and I have no idea if this is teams of just entities interested in forming various teams. I have also heard that various LANS people are heading or forming teams.
There is also the question of the 34 million. Last time they had to keep raising the fee to get more contractors to apply and in the end in came down to Bechtel and Lookheed. The fact that the fee will only be up 34 million may discourage the pure profiteer types.
Employees will lose either way. The new contract wants to streamline costs. You, the employee, are the costs.
Having been a technical evaluator on a few high visibility, high value, FAR source selection teams, the team leader will know the result he and upper management wants and will lead the team to his conclusion.
The DOE promise made to lab employees and retirees at the time of the last hand-over of "substantially equivalent" benefits likely becomes null and void once the new contractor takes over.
The LANS scores were not low across all areas. The Science, Weapons and Global Security scores were high. The capital construction and operations scores have been the problem.
July 16, 2017 at 7:31 AM
Show proof for this claim, over the necessary recent 5 year period.
July 16, 2017 at 2:06 PM should do their own homework.
We can take it that the claim of 7:31 AM is bogus. If it was factual, then they would post data to support it instead of attacking one that follows the scientific method and requests valid proof for what is otherwise seen as a fraudulent statement.
We can take it that the claim of 7:31 AM is bogus. If it was factual, then they would post data to support it instead of attacking one that follows the scientific method and requests valid proof for what is otherwise seen as a fraudulent statement.
We can take it that the claim of 7:31 AM is bogus. If it was factual, then they would post data to support it instead of attacking one that follows the scientific method and requests valid proof for what is otherwise seen as a fraudulent statement.
I'm not 2:06 PM. As posted in a different thread, the recent ST & E scores are indeed quite nice. This is not a reason to celebrate, it's a darn shame that the NNSA graders did not have the technical competence to recognize the severe degradation of the scientific capabilities of LANL over the last ten years.
Both quantity and quality of publications are down, many A people have left and are not replaced, many traditional areas of strength evaporated, entire groups disappeared, e.g., in T div. The upper management has gone to great lengths to sweep all this under the rug and pull the wool over the eyes of NNSA. Which NNSA, apparently, happily bought.
FWIW, none of the LANS scores are worth bragging about over the past 5 years. Sure the ST&E scores look good when compared to operations, but that is just celebrating a car with 2 flat tires instead of 3 flat tires. It is still an undrivable wreck, since it needs 4 good tires to be usable.
If NNSA indeed gave LANS a 95% ST&E score for FY16, that's a darn shame. How can it be when the real score should have been half of that? NNSA must've bought into fairytales LANS had spoon fed them.
It's hard to measure something one doesn't understand when that something doesn't produce an obvious scandal in the media.
Nobody on Earth can compete with UC and its 2 LLCs in core nuclear weapons ST& E. They are the bomb gods...no one else is in Olympia.
As a comparison to the RFP - "If LANL is at 2.5B per year, that translates to 25M fixed and 12.5M at risk, for a max of 37.5M"
For FY16 at LANL it was $23.8M fixed fee and $41.2M at risk, for a maximum of $65M.
I am hearing that there is now a push to increase the fee award and for rewording to make it clear that past performance is not about individualizes only about teams. I an only guess who would be trying to push this agenda.
Bingo, here it comes! My prediction: next we will observe the current LANS managers, one by one, presenting themselves as saviors of the Lab "from the years of mismanagement". Pretty soon, most of the LANS managers will be on a new bid team crusading against that vaguely defined concept called "LANS". You have to admire the ingenuity of these people.
I think egos get in the way of reality. Let's see how Craig L can explain away WIPP on his key personnel resume or Carolyn Z the SNM shipment via fedx air on hers. The source evaluation board is comprised of NNSA employees who hold security clearances and likely have enough info to call bull...t. Vendors are expected and required to be factual. Lipstick on the pig and all that.
10:04 AM has good take and would add that there are numerous items that Wallace has in background that will knock him out of consideration by the SSB.
Just ask Craig to add three, single-digit numbers together using just his fingers and toes. Anyone who would want that clown on their team deserves him.
Just ask Craig to add three, single-digit numbers together using just his fingers and toes. Anyone who would want that clown on their team deserves him.
July 18, 2017 at 7:27 PM
Ouch, true but ouch. Did it ever occur to LANS that the quality of the management just might make a difference? I am just saying, it is just a thought. Well the end results speak for themselves.
Amazing how reality is twisted here.
Carl Beard was PADOPS when the WIPP event occurred, not Leasure. Jeff Mousseau of Bechtel was ADEP and was directly responsible.
Look it up.
ADEP didn't report to PADOPS when WIPP explosion occurred .
Look it up.
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