Earlier this month, the GSA announced a new Unique Entity Identifier Standard for Federal awards management. The new standard will go into effect December 2020. It will replace the current DUNS number system as the official identifier for all businesses contracting with the U.S. Federal Government.
This should make registering to do business with the federal government a little easier, but the proof will be in the roll-out.
Continue readingMake sure to check your NAICS code size standards based on receipts, because SBA is increasing them across the board on August 19 to give small businesses more time to grow. On July 18, the SBA announced it will increase monetary-based industry size standards (meaning receipts-based and assets-based size standards).
This change is a result of adjustments for inflation that the SBA makes every five years. These rules will go into effect August 19, 2019.
Continue readingOn Friday, July 12, 2019, the U.S. House of Representatives passed its version of the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act.
While this passage may lead to an uncharacteristic political fight over appropriations, contractors will be watching whether the U.S. Senate and House bills ultimately agree upon the less politically-charged sections likely to impact their businesses.
Continue readingThe proposed National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2020 introduces new pathways for certain Department of Defense software acquisitions. These proposed software acquisition pathways would be separate from the traditional Department of Defense acquisitions process, and contain sweeping streamlining functions, especially within their supervisory structure.
If passed, this new pathway could have a significant effect on how defense agencies acquire software.
Continue readingThe draft 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, if enacted, will revoke the government’s ability to exercise rights in technical data during a supplier’s challenge to the contracting officer’s decision as to the validity of the asserted “use or release restrictions” on that data. It would reinstate the previous safeguard afforded to data suppliers, allowing them to protect their valuable–and often irreplaceable–intellectual property rights unless and until the contracting officer’s decision to remove the restrictions is sustained.
Keep in mind, this is just a draft provision, as the Senate version of the 2020 NDAA doesn’t contain the provision discussed in this blog.
Continue readingMany government contractors are familiar with FOIA requests, or requests made by individuals under the Freedom of Information Act for release of information in the federal government’s possession.
In the recent case Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader Media, the U.S. Supreme Court held that commercial or financial information is “confidential” and cannot be disclosed under FOIA where it is treated as private by its owner and provided to the government under an assurance of privacy.
Continue readingIn a unanimous decision that read like a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Kisor v. Wilke this week. All nine justices agreed that the case should be remanded to the lower court, but they expressed dramatically different reasoning.
What it means, essentially, is that for now courts will continue to defer to agencies’ reasonable interpretation of their own regulations. For contractors facing off against agencies, it means that the agencies still have the upper hand—however, SCOTUS did try to limit it some.
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