Twitter Facebook Google RSS
 
National Defense > Blog > Posts > New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

3/21/2012

New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon
Members of the House Armed Services Committee are proposing a series of procurement, contracting and auditing reforms that seeks to help businesses access the nearly $400 billion a year defense market.

A newly released report, titled, “Challenges to Doing Business With the Department of Defense,” criticizes the Pentagon for mismanaging its supplier base and for creating unnecessary “barriers to entry” to commercial companies that traditionally do not do business with the government.

Burdensome regulations and arcane auditing requirements are driving many companies to quit the defense market, and are deterring new suppliers, the report said. As a result, the panel will be asking the Pentagon to study options for outsourcing auditing responsibilities to independent agencies.

The co-chairs of the panel — Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., and Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash. — interviewed 150 business executives over the past six months and hosted seven roundtables around the country. What they heard was a consistent message: Pentagon procurement regulations discourage companies from seeking defense contracts.

During a meeting with reporters on Capitol Hill March 21, Shuster and Larsen said they worry that the Pentagon is at risk of losing valuable suppliers because it has little insight into the problems of its industrial base. Their proposed bipartisan reforms are likely to be part of the fiscal year 2013 defense authorization bill.

Shuster said the Pentagon erroneously treats the defense industry as if it were a free enterprise when in fact it is not a market-driven sector. It only has one customer and the customer sets all the rules, Shuster said. “Developing a long-term strategy is essential to supporting a strong industrial base,” he added.

Larsen said HASC plans to ask the Defense Department to provide a semi-annual update on the state of the supplier base. The Pentagon already is working on a sector-by-sector analysis, but Larsen said that so far the effort appears to be inadequate. “They are going to have to dig deeper,” said Larsen. “I saw the list they had for my district. I could have easily tripled that. For whatever reason they are not in the Pentagon’s database,” he said. “We need to get deep and accurate picture of the industrial base.”

Rather than view small businesses as a source of untapped innovation and useful technology, the Pentagon sees them as a quota requirement, as it is required to award 23 percent of annual contracts to small businesses. The panel wants to raise the goal from 23 percent to 25 percent.

“We make the case that they’re not reaching the goal now,” said Larsen. “The Pentagon also needs to not look at the small business goal as just a number to make,” said Larsen. “We want to see a quality effort to expand the role of small business.”

The auditing reforms that Shuster and Larsen propose are likely to spark controversy, as they are a radical departure from the way the Defense Contracts Auditing Agency does business. But Shuster said he believes a FINRA-like model — where a financial industry-funded agency is in charge of enforcing regulations — could be applied to defense in order to relieve an overstretched DCAA work force. This approach would still allow for high-level government has oversight, he said. An outside group can “do things more efficiently,” said Shuster. “We are going to have to study this.”

Larsen cautioned that outsourcing auditing functions does not mean backing off anti-fraud initiatives. But when he heard that a company four years ago spent three days tracking down $58 he knew something was wrong. “That’s the other extreme,” he said. “Perhaps there’s a happy medium.”

Other reforms will target Pentagon-funded research that never materializes into actual products. The Defense Department spends a billion dollars a year on so-called small-business innovation research projects, and yet “a lot of stuff dies,” said Shuster. “We want to assist small companies in commercializing.”

Export-control reforms also are mentioned in the panel’s report, although that issue falls outside HASC oversight. Regardless, the panel wants to push Congress and the administration to help ease export-controls that keep U.S. companies from selling products to foreign customers.

“We want to show support from this panel on this issue,” said Larsen. He heard from a company in his district that sells air conditioning units that the paint job, which the firm does for the Defense Department but would also like to sell overseas, would require compliance with the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.

The defense contracting and auditing environment is as bad or worse than it was 10 years ago, said Shuster. “Program managers are more risk-averse than they were 10 years ago,” he said. “And I don’t know that we can legislate that.”

Lawmakers would like to see “changes in requirements so companies want to do business with the government,” said Larsen. “Without some long-term vision from the Department of Defense on the industrial base, we could face portions of the base at risk of withering away.”

Intellectual property protections are another big beef with small businesses. The Pentagon has to make a better effort at protecting companies’ intellectual property, said Larsen. Businesses are not as worried about foreign spies stealing their sensitive data as they are about the Pentagon sharing it with competitors, said Larsen.

Asked about the prospect that his panel’s proposals will lead to real change, Shuster recognized that it is an uphill climb. “It’s a beast over there that is tough to move.”


Posted at 6:59 PM by Sandra Erwin | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (6)

Comments

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

Hey, here's an idea for "reform".  Why don't we put an end to contracts that guarantee corporations $1.10 for every $1.00 they spend developing and building weapons?  Hell, would you save money if you could find someone to give you $1.10 for every dollar you spent on anything?  What kind of idiot uses a contract like that?  Oh yeah, our "representative" government signs you and I, the US taxpayer, up to that kind of contract practically every day.  Anyone see a problem with that, or are the rest of you too stupid to know when you're being cheated?  Why don't we go back to doing business like we did during the Cold War?  Contractors then got paid for delivering a working weapon, not for lies.
Dfens at 3/22/2012 3:15 PM

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

In some cases the Government has gone overboard in the other direction.  There is a procedure called "bailment" whereby the Government will allow a company (large or small business) to acquire a contractor's proprietary design hardware for the explicit purpose of "reverse engineering".  In most cases, the Government does not own the proprietary designs.  When you add in the "patent indemnity" clause, this is worse than "imminent domain" in the real estate business.  It is in fact Government theft of companies' proprietary design data.
Norm Phillips at 3/29/2012 10:38 AM

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

Ending long term pricing contracts would also bring small price effective business' into the Government Supply chain. As a supplier of metal parts, I can only guarnatee pricing for the length of time my steel supplier will guarantee pricing which is usally 3 months. I would have to raise my price on the quote to make sure I cover my self for material price increases. Which means I am either too high on my quote and won't get the job or the Government will be paying more for the part than if it were based on a 3 month contract.
Dale Wilson at 3/29/2012 10:39 AM

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

DoD encourages "reverse engineering" in cases where the CO cannot find adequate competition.  Property rights of any owner, government of otherwise, clearly allow one to take and copy what is readily apparent so long as there are no restirctions from patents, etc... this is like getting your oil changed at Jiffy Lube instead of the dealership.
Jeffrey at 3/29/2012 10:59 AM

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

We have served the usg for 45+ years with less than a half dozen (summated total) late orders and QDR's in the past 18 years. We have also held material prices for 5.5 years twice in the same timeframe. We are a small, woman-owned business of 12 employees with very low overhead/G&A. Our products have just been placed in "Bailment", in otherwords, our government has "stolen" our design to be put on the street for reverse engineering. I take full responsibility for our actions and if we deserved to be placed in this position then it would be easy to accept. However, we offer a product that sets the standard everyone strives to achieve. Now the "bottom feeders" will dismantle our product and the Government will buy it from the lowest bider. Under the watchful eye of DCAA we make between 10-12% profit. Our product actually pays for itself in as little as 3 months and no more than 12 months. How can the usg justify such an action? This program is meant to generate competition within USG tenders, however, they cannot guarantee our product will not be sold (by the bottom dwellers) internationally. Save the world....to hell your hardworking, ingenious citizens. It will come back to bite them, do you believe the creative thinkers are going to sit back and be "bailed" upon more than once. I no longer consider myself a "Proud" american citizen.

Awestruck at 3/29/2012 5:10 PM

Re: New Wave of Procurement Reforms Could Soon Hit the Pentagon

As a former DCAA supervisor, I can say that DCAA needs to back away from even the current metrics and just allow the auditors to go out and audit.  When I started DCAA in 1974, we were all allowed to go out and audit.  Later on, the management teams became so obsessed with metrics to the point where auditing was discouraged.  Nowdays, the "productivity" metrics were done away with and were replaced by a whole new set of performance measures.  The management teams still focus on the metrics rather than auditing.  When I attended management team meetings, the bulk of the time was spent discussing metrics and putting down people who did not conform to the metrics.
Former DCAA Supervisor at 4/10/2012 12:24 AM

Add Comment
Items on this list require content approval. Your submission will not appear in public views until approved by someone with proper rights. More information on content approval.

Name: *

eMail *

Comment *

Title

Attachments

Name: *


eMail *


Comment *


 

Refresh
Please enter the text displayed in the image.
The picture contains 6 characters.

Characters *

  

Legal Notice *

NDIA is not responsible for screening, policing, editing, or monitoring your or another user's postings and encourages all of its users to use reasonable discretion and caution in evaluating or reviewing any posting. Moreover, and except as provided below with respect to NDIA's right and ability to delete or remove a posting (or any part thereof), NDIA does not endorse, oppose, or edit any opinion or information provided by you or another user and does not make any representation with respect to, nor does it endorse the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement, or other material displayed, uploaded, or distributed by you or any other user. Nevertheless, NDIA reserves the right to delete or take other action with respect to postings (or parts thereof) that NDIA believes in good faith violate this Legal Notice and/or are potentially harmful or unlawful. If you violate this Legal Notice, NDIA may, in its sole discretion, delete the unacceptable content from your posting, remove or delete the posting in its entirety, issue you a warning, and/or terminate your use of the NDIA site. Moreover, it is a policy of NDIA to take appropriate actions under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and other applicable intellectual property laws. If you become aware of postings that violate these rules regarding acceptable behavior or content, you may contact NDIA at 703.522.1820.

 

 

Bookmark and Share