Federal Marketplace (FMP) Strategy Summer 2021 Release

As a supplier, you go through a series of interactions in different phases to sell solutions in the federal marketplace.

GSA is listening and making improvements to your experience with us and in the federal marketplace! With each release, you learn about what GSA is doing to improve the experience in different phases of the acquisition journey.

As a customer, you go through a series of interactions in different phases of your buying experience for the acquisition of goods and services.

GSA is listening and making improvements to your experience with us and in the federal marketplace! With each release, you learn about what GSA is doing to improve the experience in different phases of the acquisition journey.

The Verified Products Portal (VPP) collects authoritative product content and supplier authorization information for Commercial off the Shelf (COTS) products directly from manufacturers and wholesalers. This information will be used to ensure products are accurately represented on GSA marketplaces and improve supply chain risk capabilities for eliminating illegitimate or noncompliant items. In the coming months, GSA will begin to integrate a limited amount of VPP's authoritative product content with GSA Advantage! to make this verified data available to customers for the first time.

Improvements for Customers

The VPP protects against counterfeit and otherwise non-compliant COTS products so customers can purchase with confidence. Once connected to GSA Advantage!, the VPP will ensure customers have access to product descriptions, pictures, and other details that are current, accurate, and complete.

Improvements for Workforce

Information in the VPP allows the FAS acquisition workforce to more quickly and easily identify unauthorized and prohibited COTS products for removal from the marketplace.

Improvements for Suppliers

The supplier authorization information collected by the VPP can be used to fulfill the Letter of Supply requirement, decreasing the burden associated with managing individual Letters of Supply.

If you are a manufacturer looking for more information on participating in the VPP or to learn about the impacts to Letter of Supply, visit GSA.gov/VPP.

We are now in Phase 3 of MAS Consolidation, which asks suppliers with multiple contracts to consolidate down to one. Consolidation plans are due at the end of FY 21. GSA is assisting remaining affected suppliers as they work to complete this task.

Improvements for Customers

Customers get access to contractors’ full suite of awarded offerings on the new single Schedule, making it easier to find and buy solutions that meet their mission requirements. It’s easier for customers to purchase total solutions.

Improvements for Workforce

Phase 3 includes an effort to move all suppliers to a single Procurement Contracting Officer (PCO), which reduces internal confusion and burden from having multiple COs in different acquisition centers manage contracts for the same supplier.

Improvements for Suppliers

Once contracts are consolidated, suppliers will have fewer contract administrative challenges and can more easily add products and services that would previously have been on separate contracts.

As a Best-in-Class vehicle exclusively for the 8(a) Small Businesses since 2017, the newly awarded Human Capital and Training Solutions (HCaTS) 8(a) Pool 2 will maximize the Small Business Utilization goals for federal agencies and expand 8(a) competition in the HCaTS program. (Source 05/07/2021, Pool 2 Mod [PDF - 1 MB] March 2021).

Improvements for Customers

With 21 labor categories, HCaTS 8(a) is a new strategic indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) governmentwide contract vehicle providing federal agencies with reliable, flexible, fast, and efficient ways to obtain the best value solutions for their complex human capital and training service requirements.(HCaTS Fact Sheet [PDF - 140 KB]).

Improvements for Suppliers

The HCaTS solution allows:

• ALL contract types (Firm Priced, Cost Type, Time and Materials, and Hybrid);
• Commercial or Non-commercial Procedures;
• Classified or Non-classified Services;
• CONUS/OCONUS;
• Ancillary Services and Other Direct Costs (ODC); and
• No protest for in-scope Task Orders under $10 million.

Improvements for Workforce

The on-ramping process adds 36 new contractors and opens opportunities for companies within specific socio-economic designations.

GSA merged SAM.gov into the improved beta.SAM.gov environment, dropping the beta designation and creating an easier and more intuitive experience.

Improvements for Customers, Workforce and Suppliers

The new SAM.gov is the place where suppliers and customers will continue meeting business needs including:

• Register to do business with the Federal Government.
• Find exclusion records.
• Search for contract opportunities.
• Find wage determinations and more all under a single sign on.

In response to user requests for better product pictures on GSA Advantage, we unveiled our new boost strategy in May 2021. The GSA Advantage boost strategy delivers search results showing products with pictures first. This is an incremental improvement to the Advantage search capability until the long-term solution through the Catalog Management Initiative is available.

Improvements for Customers

Customers' top two concerns related to Advantage are the ability to search for products and the accuracy of item images. GSA Advantage’s boost strategy makes it easier for customers to find the products they are looking for. It also encourages vendors to provide quality images to gain a competitive edge.

ASSIST is an easy-to-use, modernized system designed to support customers, suppliers, and the FAS Assisted Acquisition Services (AAS) workforce in task and delivery order management. With the release of ASSIST 2.0 in May 2021, GSA decommissioned multiple duplicative legacy systems including: the IT Solutions Shop (ITSS) and the Integrated Task Order Management System (ITOMS) that supported the regions and; FEDSIM’s: Tracking and Ordering System (TOS) and Order Management Information System (OMIS).

Improvements for Customers, Suppliers, & Workforce

ASSIST 2.0 provides users with a single experience for all GSA Assisted Acquisitions. Enhancements include new capabilities, functionality, and tools developed to improve the user experience from solicitation to award administration for AAS stakeholders, including:

• Improved online collaboration tools to facilitate requests, approvals, and other post-award administration activities between clients, contractors and GSA.
• Consistent bilateral signature capabilities for all Awards and all modifications.
• Greater flexibility and number of primary and alternate supplier points of contact (POC) to identify the participants administering the Award.
• Improved reporting capabilities to help contractors manage their awards and clients manage funding and interagency agreements with GSA. Robust reporting and intuitive help documents.

For additional questions please contact the ASSIST Service Desk.

CALM, GSA’s modern, efficient enterprise contract writing system, is now live for a portion of the GSA workforce. Eighty existing contracts are being migrated during this pilot phase.

Improvements for Workforce

CALM, GSA’s modern, efficient enterprise contract writing system, empowers the FAS workforce to create new acquisition workspaces, procurement requests, solicitations and awards. It eliminates manual processes across the acquisition life-cycle and produces quality contracts that comply with authoritative references.