Brian Dunbar

Headquarters, Washington, DC November 20, 1997

(Phone: 202/358-0873)

Bill Bearden

General Services Administration, Washington, DC

(Phone: 202/501-1231)

RELEASE: 97- 275

NASA, GSA JOIN FORCES ON OUTSOURCING DESKTOP COMPUTING NASA and the
General Services Administration (GSA) have agreed to work together to
procure desktop computing and networking services in a way that should
save taxpayers millions of dollars in the coming years. NASA
Administrator Daniel S. Goldin and GSA Administrator Dave Barram
announced the formation of the partnership after extensive discussions
and working group sessions within the agencies. Under the terms of the
partnership, the agencies will work closely together to implement GSA\'s
Seat Management Program and NASA\'s Outsourcing Desktop Initiative
(ODIN). GSA and NASA acquisition teams will share information, resources
and key personnel, and NASA will include provisions in its ODIN
contracts that will give GSA exclusive authority to issue and administer
government-wide orders against ODIN contracts. \"We\'re going to pool
our talents, and the benefits will be government-wide,\" said Lee
Holcomb, NASA\'s Chief Information Officer. \"This approach recognizes
the diversity of the government computing environment and will allow
federal agencies a choice to select which contract best suits their
individual needs,\" said Charles Self, GSA assistant commissioner for
Information Technology Integration. \"Outsourcing offers great potential
to improve management of these distributed assets and enhances the
government\'s ability to keep information technology current at
competitive commercial prices.\" Both agencies were separately arriving
at different approaches to outsourcing computer equipment services,
Holcomb said. \"The partnership gives a richer set of options to federal
agencies. And it\'s a way for us to be sure we\'re doing outsourcing
right. We can learn from each other.\" ODIN will require vendors to
deliver specific end-to-end desktop, server, and local area
communications services. These services will be offered under ODIN
through a single fixed price per seat which includes computing,
networking, maintenance, training, etc., and all associated costs. The
ODIN service requirements are based on a comprehensive analysis across
NASA of end-user and organizational needs and of commercial practices.
Under Seat Management, the government will acquire integrated services
and the required components to include general purpose desktop
computers, servers and associated peripherals; high performance
computational systems and associated peripherals; local area and wide
area network capabilities; commercial software; help-desk services;
maintenance; design and installation; and training. GSA\'s objectives
are to acquire quality desktop computing services as a utility in an
integrated fashion through a single source and to achieve cost savings
based on the private sector\'s ability to obtain and manage assets.
GSA\'s Office of Information Technology Integration (ITI) will proceed
with its government-wide Seat Management contracts, and NASA will
continue to work toward award of its ODIN contracts. Whereas GSA\'s Seat
Management contracts will have a very broad scope to allow agencies the
flexibility to construct \"seats\" to meet individual agency
requirements, NASA\'s ODIN contracts will permit outsourcing for
specific, pre-defined seat configurations. After extensive discussion
and the evaluation of numerous alternatives, Self and Holcomb concluded
that proceeding with both solicitations is in the best interests of
NASA, GSA and the government. GSA has issued its Request for Proposals
(RFP) for Seat, and NASA expects to issue an RFP for ODIN in the next
several weeks, with the contract award and selection for both planned
for next spring. - end -