Actionet, Inc. v. United States

In the United States Court of Federal Claims

No. 19-388C

(Filed: April 22, 2019)

(Reissued: May 7, 2019) 1

NOT FOR PUBLICATION

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ACTIONET, INC.,

Plaintiff,

Post-award bid protest;

v. Preliminary injunction;

Likelihood of success

THE UNITED STATES, on the merits; Standing;

Prejudice; Unstated

Defendant, evaluation criteria;

Disparate treatment.

and

ACCENTURE FEDERAL SERVICES LLC,

Intervenor.

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OPINION

This is a post-award bid protest of the Department of Energy’s

(“DOE”) award of a Blanket Purchase Agreement for Information

Technology services to Accenture Federal Services LLC (“Accenture”).

Plaintiff, ActioNet, Inc., currently holds an IDIQ task order contract with

DOE for IT services. Currently pending is plaintiff’s motion for a

preliminary injunction. Oral argument was held on April 11, 2019. As

announced at the conclusion of that argument, we deny the motion, primarily

due to a lack of likelihood of success on the merits.

1

This opinion was originally issued under seal to afford the parties an

opportunity to propose the redaction of protected information. The parties

did not agree on all of the proposed redactions. We have redacted

information necessary to safeguard the competitive process. Redactions are

indicated by brackets.

BACKGROUND

I. The Solicitation

DOE issued Request for Quotations No. DE-SOL-0008790 (“RFQ”

or “solicitation”) on November 15, 2017, asking holders of Federal Supply

Schedule 70 contracts to submit bids for a single award blanket purchase

agreement (“BPA”) against which orders could be placed for information

technology (“IT”), telecommunications, and cybersecurity services for a

period of up to five years (one base year and four option years). The total

estimated value for all five years was $2,000,000,000. The BPA as a whole

is known as “CBOSS,” which stands for CIO Business Operations Support

Service. The RFQ included performance work statements (“PWS”) for two

planned initial orders: one for IT Modernization Strategy Support, known as

the “IM-60;” and the other was for Cybersecurity Strategy and Program

Management Support, known as “IM-30.” In large part, bidders were to

tailor their offers to these two task orders. 2

The agency made the award on a best value tradeoff basis, which was

promised by the RFQ, based on the four following factors: 1) Past

Performance, 2) Management Approach, 3) Technical Approach, and 4)

Price. Past Performance was the most important evaluation factor and was

rated for relevance and quality of performance with an overall adjectival

rating of either Outstanding, Good, Satisfactory, Marginal, or Unsatisfactory.

DOE reserved for itself the right to eliminate offers rated marginal or lower

on Past Performance, and it did so for one offeror.

Management Approach, the second most important factor, and

Technical Approach, the third in importance, were also rated adjectively

from Outstanding to Unsatisfactory. Proposals were assigned strengths and

weaknesses for these two factors according to the definitions provided in the

2

For example, the solicitation specifically solicited examples (three of the

six required) of doing work similar to the two planned task orders; the

Technical Approach factor was measured against the PWSs for these two

task orders; and a major portion of the price evaluation was of these two task

orders.

2

solicitation. See Pl.’s Ex. 1 at 699. 3 The overall adjectival ratings for these

factors were dependent on these strengths and weaknesses assigned as well.

Although the RFQ estimated a total value of $2 billion for the BPA

across five years, it did not require the agency to evaluate the total price of

each offer. Instead, the solicitation stated that the agency would compare

labor rates across offers, total prices for the two anticipated initial orders (IM-

60 and IM-30), and the load percentage to be charged on other direct costs

and materials. The results of the BPA labor rates evaluation was the most

important element of the price evaluation. The solicitation also stated that

the agency would perform a price realism and reasonableness analysis of all

offerors’ prices and rates. The agency reserved the right to conduct

discussions with offerors but warned that it might make an award without

having done so.

II. The Evaluation and Award

The Technical Evaluation Committee (“TEC”) performed the non-

price evaluation of offers and presented its findings to the Source Selection

Official (“SSO”), who frequently met with the TEC and the Contracting

Officer (“CO”) throughout the evaluation process. The CO conducted the

price analysis. The source selection decision was made by the SSO.

DOE received six offers in response to the RFQ. The TEC first

evaluated the Past Performance factor by itself, completing that evaluation

on September 24, 2018. One of the six offerors was eliminated by the CO

because it was rated only marginal for Past Performance. The TEC then

completed its evaluation of the other two non-price factors on November 19,

2018. The results for all three factors were as follows (ranked in order):

3

“PX” refers to Plaintiff’s Exhibit; “DX” refers to Defendant’s Exhibit.

Because briefing on the motion for preliminary relief was completed prior to

the filing of the Administrative Record, citations to the procurement record

are to the documents as the parties presented them as attachments to their

briefs.

3

Quoter Past Performance Management Technical

Approach Approach

Accenture Outstanding Good Good

Quoter No. 2 Good Outstanding Good

Quoter No. 3 Satisfactory Outstanding Good

Quoter No. 4 Satisfactory Good Good

ActioNet Satisfactory Satisfactory Satisfactory

PX 5 at 9. 4

The CO completed her price analysis the next day on November 20,

2018. All five remaining offerors’ prices were found to be both fair and

reasonable overall, but plaintiff’s evaluated prices for the two initial tasks

orders were found to be unrealistically low. The highest offeror was

$25,990,987.33 for the two orders; Accenture was at $21,358,203.81; and

ActioNet bid the work for only [ ]. The next lowest offeror, by

comparison, was $19,766,505.24.

The CO evaluated the BPA labor rates by comparing the offerors’

proposed rates against one another for each category. The mean for each

labor category was calculated and then a standard deviation analysis was

performed against that mean for each category. Rates within two standard

deviations on the low side of the mean and one standard deviation above

were considered to be within range. The CO then evaluated what

percentage of all of the labor categories each offeror’s prices were. The

higher the number, the better. Plaintiff was evaluated to have 90.8% of its

rates within range while intervenor was found to have 72.3%.

As to the load rates for materials and other direct costs, ActioNet had

a range of rates starting at [ ] for materials and subcontractor costs up to [

] for travel and other direct costs. Accenture offered [ ] for its load across

categories and a [ ] load for its teaming partner [ ].

The SSO reviewed the analyses performed by the TEC and CO and

ranked the offers for non-price factors. Intervenor was the highest ranked,

and plaintiff was the lowest. Accenture was chosen as the most

advantageous (best value) quote to the government. The SSO did, however,

4

Further factual detail regarding the non-price evaluations will be supplied

as necessary as we discuss the merits of the protest below.

4

perform a trade-off analysis between Accenture and each of the four other

offerors in her source selection decision. As between the plaintiff and the

intervenor, the SSO found that ActioNet had a price advantage in the

categories of BPA and load rates, but, due to the unrealistically low prices

offered for the two initial offers, the SSO determined that the price factor

was not in favor of plaintiff. The SSO’s decision document also states that,

even if plaintiff’s order prices were found to be realistic, she would still

award to Accenture due to the technical (including Past Performance)

advantage offered by its quote. The trade-offs between intervenor and the

other offerors each also ended with the conclusion that the rating for Past

Performance was the most important discriminator in choosing Accenture for

award.

III. Procedural History

DOE notifed the offerors of its decision on November 30, 2018, and

awarded the first two task orders on December 6, 2018. The period of

performance began the next day. Plaintiff filed a protest at the Government

Accountability Office (“GAO”) on December 10, 2018, however, which

resulted in an automatic stay of performance. GAO denied the protest on

March 5, 2019, finding both that the agency had a reasonable basis for its

evaluation and award decision and that ActioNet lacked standing because it

did not challenge the ratings of the offerors other than Accenture rated higher

than it. ActioNet, Inc., B-417173, 2019 CPD ¶ 100 (Comp. Gen. Mar. 5,

2019).

Plaintiff filed its complaint in this court on March 13, 2019, along

with a request for a Temporary Restraining Order (“TRO”) and a preliminary

injunction. A status conference was held on March 14, 2019. Accenture

intervened on that day as well. Although the agency represented that it had

no plans to issue any new orders prior to April 12, 2019 (the date when

plaintiff’s incumbent contract was set to expire), plaintiff maintained its

request for a preliminary injunction. We entered a briefing schedule on

March 18, 2019, concluding with oral argument on April 11, 2019.

On March 19, 2019, the government filed a notice of intent to issue

six additional task orders on or by March 21, 2019. This prompted plaintiff

to file a motion on March 22, 2019, requesting that the court issue interim

relief to preserve the status quo until the preliminary injunction hearing on

April 11, 2019. After a response from defendant on March 28, 2019, we

5

denied the request for interim relief by order on March 29, 2019, finding that

plaintiff had not made a showing of irreparable harm if an injunction were

not issued prior to the preliminary injunction hearing. ActioNet, Inc. v.

United States, No. 19-388C, 2019 WL 1423096, at *3-4 (Fed. Cl. Mar. 29,

2019). Oral argument on plaintiff’s motion for a preliminary injunction was

held on April 11, 2019, at the conclusion of which we announced that the

court would deny plaintiff’s motion and requested the parties to propose a

briefing schedule for resolution on the merits of a permanent injunction. We

confirmed that result by short order on April 12, 2019. This opinion

contains our reasoning for having done so.

DISCUSSION

We have jurisdiction over challenges to agency actions taken or not

taken in connection with a federal procurement. See 28 U.S.C. § 1491(b)

(2012). Our review under this section is deferential to agency decision

making in accordance with the standard set forth in the Administrative

Procedures Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706, which is to say that we review agency action

in a procurement for illegality and a lack of rationality. Impressa

Construzioni Geom. Domenico Garufi v. United States, 238 F.3d 1324, 1332-

33 (Fed. Cir. 2001). So long as the agency’s decision was not irrational or

otherwise illegal, we will leave it undisturbed.

The issue of prejudice is also relevant to our review under this statute.

First, a protestor must show that it is an economically interested party, which,

in the post-award context, means that it had a substantial chance of award but

for the alleged error(s) of the agency. Data Gen. Corp. v. Johnson, 78 F.3d

1556, 1562 (Fed. Cir. 1996). The protestor need not show that it was next

in line for award, however, to establish standing, only that there would have

been a reasonable likelihood of it being awarded the contract. Id. at 1563

If it cannot make such a showing, it was not prejudiced by the error(s), and

jurisdiction will not attach. Even if the disappointed bidder establishes

standing, it must also show that the error alleged was prejudicial, which

means that, not only an error took place, but that it affected the outcome of

the agency’s decision. Labatt Food Serv., Inc. v. United States, 577 F.3d

1375, 1380-81 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (holding that the agency’s acceptance of bid

revisions by email did not prejudice protestor because it had no bearing on

the agency’s review of final proposals).

Here, we find that plaintiff has established standing. Plaintiff alleges

6

that it was rated too low for each of the non-price factors, alleges that its

prices should have been viewed more favorably, and that intervenor was

rated more highly for several of the factors. We also know that the agency

performed a trade-off between Accenture and ActioNet. We thus conclude

that, had plaintiff been evaluated more favorably and/ or intervenor been

rated less favorably, a different outcome is reasonably likely. Put another

way, as both this court and the Federal Circuit have articulated the test, when

the protestor shows that it is “‘within the active zone of consideration’” by

the agency, it has established standing. E.g., Advanced Mgmt. Strategies

Group, Inc. v. United States, 139 Fed. Cl. 404, 411 (2018) (quoting Alfa

Laval Separation, Inc. v. United States, 175 F.3d 1365, 1367 (Fed. Cir.

1999)). We will consider the separate prejudice question as it pertains to the

merits below.

Standing established, we move to the merits of plaintiff’s request for

a preliminary injunction. We consider four factors when entertaining a

request for preliminary injunctive relief: (1) plaintiff’s likelihood of success

on the merits; (2) whether plaintiff will suffer irreparable harm without the

injunction; (3) the balance of the harms between the parties; and (4) the

public’s interest in an injunction. Bona Fide Conglomerate, Inc. v. United

States, 96 Fed. Cl. 233, 239 (2010). This court is generally reticent to enjoin

agency procurement action without a showing that the protestor is likely to

succeed on the underlying merits of its protest. See Intelligent Waves, LLC

v. United States, 135 Fed. Cl. 299, 314 (2017). We begin with the first

factor, as it is dispositive in this case.

Plaintiff broadly attacks each and every element of DOE’s evaluation

of its own procurement, arguing at each step that it should have been more

highly rated and that it was treated differently than other offerors. It also

argues that intervenor’s rating for the Past Performance factor was too high.

Although plaintiff’s attack is broad in scope, its briefing and oral argument

was focused more specifically on certain arguments. This opinion is

generally concerned with those more focused inquiries, but we have

considered each of plaintiff’s arguments and find that none of them support

a showing of likelihood of success on the merits. 5

5

Plaintiff’s brief incorporated by reference large sections of its complaint to

fill in the details of its arguments in violation of RCFC 5.4(b)(3), which

requires materials incorporated by reference to be included in the page count

for the limit on the length of briefs. We have not, however, struck any

7

I. Past Performance

We begin with the most important evaluation factor, Past

Performance. The thrust of plaintiff’s argument is that its own past

performance examples were irrationally viewed as less relevant than they

should have been and that DOE irrationally found ActioNet’s performance

for several of these contract efforts to have been less stellar than the agency

had previously rated those efforts in the past. As to intervenor’s rating, the

primary argument offered by plaintiff is that Accenture’s references for IT

migration services were considered more relevant than they should have

been. Plaintiff also sees disparate treatment in this regard by DOE as

between it and the intervenor. Plaintiff further argues that the agency

impermissibly relaxed the requirements to receive an Outstanding rating for

Accenture despite not finding each of intervenor’s references to have

exceeded the scope of the solicitation’s requirements, as plaintiff argues is

required by the RFQ.

Each offeror was required to provide six narrative examples of past

performance. These six were to show similar services performed to the

CBOSS PWS and to show similar levels of size, scope, and complexity. Of

the required examples, DOE asked, among other things, that two of them be

examples of “IT Modernization/Cloud Migration.” PX 1 at 700. DOE

promised to review the past performance questionnaires for each of the past

performance efforts and stated that it might review any available past

performance records, such as CPARs. The agency also reserved the right to

contact references for each narrative example as well as review other

pertinent past performance information (“any other source”). Id. at 702.

A. Plaintiff’s Past Performance

Plaintiff provided five of its six references from the incumbent IDIQ

DOE contract. The sixth was for its [

]. Past performance questionnaires were available for all six

references, and DOE reviewed the CPARs ratings going back as far as 2012

for all offerors’ provided references. DOE also contacted, or attempted to

contact, technical points-of-contact (“POC”) for each reference.

The result for plaintiff was that its CPARs ratings were very good

portion of plaintiff’s briefs or considered any arguments waived due to this

mistake. For further briefing, plaintiff is directed to comport with Rule 5.4.

8

(none were obtainable for the [ ] contract); the questionnaires were largely

good and ranged from [ ] to [ ]; the interviews of POCs,

however, were mixed and contained some information that DOE viewed

negatively, or as the agency put it “a significant amount of highly

unfavorable feedback.” PX 3 at 51. The agency thus found some risk

attached to plaintiff’s Past Performance information but found that the

information was generally favorable. It also found that some of plaintiff’s

references were not as relevant as the agency sought. It thus awarded a

Satisfactory rating for plaintiff.

Plaintiff attacks the agency’s conclusion in general by comparing its

CPARs ratings, which were favorable across the board, with DOE’s finding

that there was significant unfavorable information present for ActioNet,

which DOE found to present some risk of poor performance going forward.

In plaintiff’s view, its high CPARs ratings should have afforded it a higher

overall rating. We disagree.

The agency reviewed what it said that it would and came to a

documented conclusion that is rationally related to the information that it

received and reviewed. 6 DOE might have weighted the relative merits of

the CPARs more heavily and come to a different conclusion, but it neither

violated applicable law nor the solicitation’s promised evaluation scheme in

reaching the conclusion that it did; we thus cannot upset the result.

Plaintiff also argued more particularly that its two narrative examples

for IT modernization and migration should have been viewed by the agency

6

We are cognizant that the agency admittedly was operating under a

misapprehension as to one of the POC interviews that it conducted. The

contract effort cited by that POC was not one of the six provided references

by plaintiff. We do not reach the question of whether this was

impermissible per the terms of the solicitation, however, because we find no

prejudice from this error to the plaintiff. Plaintiff has not shown how the

absence of this information would have changed the result of the agency’s

Past Performance evaluation. Other less-than-favorable information would

have remained from the POC interviews, including the TEC’s finding of

significant unfavorable information for ActioNet’s example of IT

Modernization/Cloud Migration, a highly relevant focus of the CBOSS

procurement.

9

to be more relevant than they were. Much of the briefing and oral argument

was spent on this allegation, the crux of which is that the agency used a metric

of 13,000 users migrated from legacy systems to cloud-based systems to

determine relevancy for these examples. The agency found that plaintiff did

not show that it met this requirement for either example, but it found that

intervenor’s examples did. Plaintiff argues that this was an unstated

evaluation criterion because the agency morphed the 13,000 “user”

requirement to mean “seat type users with distinct credentials,” which it

views as the only way that the agency could have found it not to have met

the requirement. PX 3 at 41. Plaintiff also argues that it was treated

unequally in this regard because it views intervenor’s two examples as

insufficient to meet the test.

1. Unstated Criteria

The allegation that the agency applied a different meaning of “users”

than that stated in the RFQ must be rejected because plaintiff has not shown

how it was prejudiced by the error. This criteria was applied equally across

all offerors, and to the extent that it was a mystery prior to bid submission,

that mystery prejudiced all offerors equally, which is to say that it prejudiced

none of them as regards the outcome. 7 The fact that intervenor was found

to have met the requirement, without having known what to aim for prior to

bidding, is not evidence of prejudice in this instance because it is only

happenstance that it met the requirement. Plaintiff has not alleged bad faith

or unequal access to information prior to bidding. Thus we conclude that

there is no prejudice here even if the exact definition used by the agency was

unstated prior to bidding.

We also do not view this allegation as otherwise having merit. The

fact that the agency cited a more specific definition of a general term from

the solicitation is not per se irrational nor application of an unstated criteria.

Defendant and Intervenor provided several citations to the record where the

agency clearly intimated what it was looking for regarding migrating “end

users” and that the agency was looking for a “managed seat service

environment.” PX 1 at 253 (“end users”); id. at 383-84 (“managed seat

service environment” and “seat service end users.”). We think the offerors

7

Plaintiff does not allege that it would have offered a different past

performance example had it known of the definition of users ahead of time.

10

were on notice of the agency’s bent in this regard.

2. Disparate Treatment

ActioNet also believes that it should have been found to have met the

13,000 user requirement and that Accenture should not have, which is in its

view unequal treatment. Plaintiff’s first cited example of cloud-base

migration involved the moving of accounts for Office 365, a cloud-based

suite of applications. Plaintiff provided that it moved [ ] users and [ ]

generic mailboxes to these cloud-based programs. For its second cited

example, plaintiff offered its migration of DOE’s website from a self-hosted

solution to a cloud-based one, which now has [ ] of monthly page views

but only [ ] of DOE users on the inside managing the content of the

website. The agency found neither of these examples to have met the

requirement. For the first example, [ ] is not 13,000, and the agency did

not consider the additional [ ] generic mailboxes to be users. For the

second example, the DOE website, the agency again found that website

viewers were not the same thing as the industry standard of a “user,” which

is a “credentialed user.” PX 3 at 43. We are in no position to disagree with

these conclusions.

Plaintiff also alleges that Accenture too should have been found not

to be compliant with the 13,000 user requirement. The first example

provided by intervenor to the agency for this requirement was its work for

the [ ] on the

[ ] website, which has millions of users and hundreds of thousands

of concurrent users daily. Plaintiff argues that this example is inapposite

because Accenture did not migrate the [ ] website to the cloud; it alleges

that was done by a prior contractor. Thus, even assuming the proper metric

was used, plaintiff should not have been credited with this work.

Defendant rebutted this point at oral argument by showing that

intervenor did not claim credit for the initial move of the website to the cloud

nor was the agency confused about this fact. In fact, Accenture’s proposal

represented that it migrated three critical applications used on the website to

the cloud; the three applications have [ ] users. See id. at 38 (stating

that Accenture had “migrated three core systems” to the cloud). We thus

find no basis to question the agency’s views of these contracts due to this

distinction.

11

The second cited example of cloud migration by Accenture was its

migration of the [

] to a cloud-based application. Both the proposal and DOE’s

evaluation of it cite over [ ] credentialed users of this system. We thus

find a rational connection between the requirement of the migration of

13,000 end users to this cited effort and find no reason to call into question

the agency’s evaluation in this regard.

B. Accenture’s Outstanding Rating for Past Performance

The last avenue of plaintiff’s challenge to DOE’s past performance

evaluation concerns whether intervenor was eligible to receive an

Outstanding rating per the terms of the solicitation. The RFQ states that a

proposal will be considered to be Outstanding for Past Performance if the

quoter shows that its

Past Performance examples involved greater size, scope,

magnitude of effort, and complexity as the CBOSS BPA

requires, and the Past Performance record is highly favorable,

with little or no adverse information. It supports an

expectation of a very high level of confidence in outstanding

performance and customer satisfaction with little risk.

PX 1 at 697. At oral argument, plaintiff argued that the fact that only two

of the references of intervenor were shown to involve greater size, scope,

magnitude of effort, and complexity shows that it should have been

considered Good at best. We disagree.

The term “involved” can be read several ways. It could mean that

each example of Past Performance exceeded CBOSS requirements, or it

could be read to mean that, of all of the examples provided by an offeror,

some must involve a scope greater than CBOSS. The agency applied the

second definition. That is not unreasonable nor was it applied unequally to

different offerors. In sum, we have considered all of plaintiff’s offered

arguments regarding Past Performance, including those not specifically

referenced above, and find them unavailing. Plaintiff has not shown a

likelihood of success on the merits for Past Performance.

12

II. Management Approach

For the Management Approach factor, plaintiff’s argument centered

on how the agency evaluated the relevant experience of ActioNet’s offered

key personnel. Admittedly, the TEC’s report mistakenly stated a higher

number of years for the relevant categories than the solicitation required.

There is no dispute that this mistake was made, but we agree with GAO that

the particular number of years was not the basis for plaintiff’s weakness

under this factor. ActioNet, Inc., 2019 CPD ¶ 100 at 9-10. It was instead

the fact that ActioNet’s proposal for its key personnel lacked sufficient detail

to determine whether its personnel had the requisite experience (even if the

number listed for necessary years of experience was too high). See PX 4 at

32-33 (Management Approach evaluation of supporting documentation for

key personnel). We have reviewed plaintiff’s Attachment F and conclude

that the agency was not irrational in finding it to be lacking sufficient detail

for DOE to satisfy itself that plaintiff’s personnel had the required years of

experience. 8

III. Technical Approach

The Technical Approach factor was not discussed during oral

argument, but we briefly consider it here because it is plain from the record

that the agency had a reasonable basis for its evaluation of this factor. DOE

considered the proposed approach for the two initial task orders under this

factor. Plaintiff was assigned two weakness for its IM-60 approach and one

weakness for the IM-30 order. Plaintiff challenges all of them.

8

We are also satisfied that there was no error in how DOE contacted and

considered plaintiff’s key personnel references. As explained in

defendant’s brief, faced with too many potential references to contact in a

short period of time, the TEC limited the references it contacted to those who

were project references as opposed to more general business references. We

also see no irrationality in the TEC’s conclusion that one of plaintiff’s

references was potentially biased due to her current employment at ActioNet.

The fact that the TEC was unable to reach another of plaintiff’s references is

no evidence or irrationality or misconduct. That person was retired, and

plaintiff did not provide DOE with up-to-date contact information for him.

13

A. IM-60 Order

The TEC found plaintiff’s approach for this initial task order to be

problematic because the timeframe proposed was, in the agency’s view, too

short to achieve the level of satisfactory performance it desired. One of the

overarching goals of the contract was to obtain a modernization and updating

of DOE’s IT infrastructure and cybersecurity. The IM-60 task order was

anticipated to be an agency wide survey of DOE’s IT infrastructure and

environment and to identify future needs across the agency. The anticipated

period of performance for this task order was six months with an additional

six-month option.

Plaintiff proposed to complete its [ ] agency-wide assessment in[

]. PX 7 at 5 (timeline); id. at 6-9

(narrative description). DOE assigned a weakness for this timeframe, finding

it to be evidence that plaintiff did not understand the requirement. Plaintiff

views that conclusion as factually wrong, arguing that the agency misread its

proposal. Plaintiff urges that the [

].

We agree with GAO that DOE had a rational basis for its conclusion

in this regard. See ActioNet, Inc., 2019 CPD ¶ 100 at 12. Even considering

the [ ] nature of the report to be produced in [ ], it was

reasonable for the agency to consider that too short a period of performance

for even a draft, not to mention that plaintiff’s [ ] was much

accelerated compared to the agency’s anticipated 6-12 month period. A [

] report would necessarily be comprehensive in scope, meaning that the

majority of fact gathering, and evaluative work would be complete in that

period. That is a reasonable basis on which the agency could conclude as it

did.

The second weakness assessed to plaintiff’s proposed effort for the

IM-60 order was for ActioNet’s lack of details for its risk management and

mitigation plan. Plaintiff takes aim at this weakness by citing its [

]. The TEC concluded that this

high-level approach was insufficient as it was unrelated to the execution of

the IM-60 effort. We find no irrationality with this conclusion.

14

B. IM-30 Order

The second initial task order was aimed at providing immediate and

critical support to DOE’s cybersecurity efforts across the agency. The TEC

found that the [ ] full-time equivalents (“FTEs”) proposed to complete this

task order were insufficient for the level of service sought and even the level

of service proposed by ActioNet. The agency found this [ ] level of effort

to be a risk to the successful execution of the task order.

Plaintiff argues, first, that this was a mechanical application of an

unstated labor floor, and, second, that plaintiff was not given credit for the

[

]. Defendant and intervenor respond that the agency did not

mechanically apply a labor floor but instead found that the number of hours

proposed by plaintiff to be problematic. We agree.

There is no support in the record for the idea that the agency had an

unstated minimum number of hours that it was looking for offerors to

propose for this task order. The TEC reviewed the contract requirements

and the proposed effort of ActioNet and concluded that the number of FTEs

offered by plaintiff to be inconsistent with both. Plaintiff has not shown

how it was otherwise irrational for the agency to conclude as it did. The

idea that the agency should have read into plaintiff’s proposal [

]. We find that

DOE reasonably reached the conclusion that it did in this regard.

IV. Price

Plaintiff raises two primary issues as it relates to the CO’s price

evaluation and the SSO’s use of that evaluation in her award decision. The

first is that the agency failed to give plaintiff proper credit for the price

advantage that it offered for BPA labor rates and load rates. The second

issue is with the agency’s finding that plaintiff’s price for the IM-60 and IM-

30 task order was too low (unrealistic).

As to the first issue, we find no error to have occurred. The agency

conducted a standard deviation analysis of all proposed rates and then

compared those rates across all offers to figure out what percentage of overall

15

rates fell within the range that the agency set. Plaintiff does not take issue

with this approach in general. It argues instead that its higher percentage of

rates within the range, when contrasted to Accenture’s lower level, should

have resulted in a more favorable rating for it. The same basic argument is

made for the non-labor load rates, i.e., that plaintiff’s lower rates for this

category vis-à-vis intervenor should have made some difference to the

agency’s ultimate conclusion.

The award decision makes clear that the SSO was aware of ActioNet’s

advantages as to these two considerations. It plainly stated so. The SSO

did not, however, find that those two advantages would overcome the

technical superiority of intervenor’s proposal, especially given the unrealistic

prices for the two task orders proposed by plaintiff. We find no irrationality

in these conclusions. 9 We note also that plaintiff cannot show prejudicial

harm as it pertains to price. The agency was clear that it valued the more

highly ranked Accenture proposal as a better value to the government in view

of its needs for this BPA. Without having successfully established that the

agency made reversible errors in its non-price evaluation, any error as to

plaintiff’s prices is harmless. It was the lowest rated technical offeror. In

view of the agency’s statements in the SSO’s award decision, any price

advantage could not have bridged that gap.

V. Balance Of Harms

Even were we to agree with plaintiff on the merits, plaintiff would not

otherwise be entitled to preliminary injunctive relief. Although there is a

case to be made for plaintiff suffering some harm at this juncture without an

injunction, the balance of harms does not support an injunction. The parties

submitted a series of competing declarations regarding the harm to be

suffered absent an injunction on plaintiff’s part and because of an injunction

on intervenor’s and the agency’s part. Without detailing each, it is sufficient

to say that the agency’s desire to begin modernizing its IT infrastructure by

9

As it concerns the agency’s conclusion that plaintiff’s price for the two task

orders was too low, we see no basis for quibbling with that conclusion. It is

clear that DOE was looking for a larger scope of work for these two orders

than plaintiff viewed them as requiring. The agency’s analysis of these two

task orders supports that conclusion. We are in no position to second-guess

the agency’s own assessment of its needs.

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moving services to the cloud and its desire to obtain additional cybersecurity

services as quickly as possible rises to, at a minimum, equal the harms to be

suffered by plaintiff’s loss of revenue and potential loss of personnel, both

of which seem less than irreparable given that the awardee of this contract is

looking at approximately $2 billion in work over five years. 10

CONCLUSION

On the whole, we find that plaintiff’s disagreements with the agency

are just that, a difference of opinion on the relative merits of the proposals

the agency reviewed. Such disagreements are insufficient to establish a

likelihood of success on the merits. That fact in combination with the

relative balance of the harms alleged make a preliminary inunction

inappropriate. Thus, we denied plaintiff’s motion for a preliminary

injunction.

s/Eric G. Bruggink

Eric G. Bruggink

Senior Judge

10

As to the latter, we note that intervenor offered a competing declaration

regarding whether any of plaintiff’s personnel had been offered positions,

averring that they had not.

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