Both emerging and experienced players in the government contract arena know one thing for certain: current government contracting is focused primarily on cost savings and efficiency.   In other words, how successful your firm is in winning business with government customers will depend primarily on your ability to provide goods and services at a lower cost [...]

Can you win a government contract when you are bidding against an incumbent that has been entrenched with an agency for many years? The answer is a qualified yes. It is possible to unseat an incumbent in the federal marketplace if you submit the right type of proposal. The bottom line is you will need [...]

Earlier this month, we discussed the federal source selection process, including how proposals are reviewed, evaluated, selected, and ultimately awarded. To recap, we talked about how government officials use multiple sources of information when making award decisions. In this blog, we’d like to address one of the most common factors: Past Performance. Simply put, Past [...]

When the federal government issues an RFP asking companies to submit proposals to manufacture goods or supply services on a contract basis, the application process is complex and highly detailed. Likewise, there is an equally specific way through which the winning bid is selected. This selection process is defined by the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) [...]

We're excited to announce two new additions to our team! Adam Stormer has joined Richter’s Competitive Intelligence team as a Research Analyst. Mr. Stormer began his career in Cyber Forensics and Information Security before earning a Master of Science degree in Applied Intelligence from Mercyhurst University. At Mercyhurst, Mr. Stormer was a team lead for [...]

Where and when is a little knowledge a dangerous thing? Sometimes, when it’s time to rebid a government contract in the federal marketplace, knowing more than your competitors do can be the beginning of the end. In other words, when you are the incumbent—that is, the company that currently owns the contract and who has [...]

Developing Aggressive Pricing: Overhead vs. G&A The government contracting arena is filled with words, phrases, and acronyms that can be difficult for the less experienced to define, let alone distinguish subtle differences between. G&A (General and Administrative) costs and OH (Overhead) costs are two good examples. What do they mean and, more importantly, what are [...]

When you’re looking for a ballpark estimate, an analogous (AKA “back of the envelope”) calculation may be all you need. After a quick look at the budget over the last five years, you can do a quick run rate, determine trends in play, and extrapolate those numbers into a rough estimate. Ultimately, this technique is [...]

SWOT analyses have been around a long time, and continue to be popular in the business development community. Unfortunately, the vast majority of SWOT analyses are essentially useless—not because the tool is broken, but because it’s not being used properly. The ultimate goal of a SWOT analysis is to produce actionable intelligence—and yet that is [...]

The way you handle sunk costs when attempting to break into a new market in the federal contracting arena can be the difference between success and failure. Deciding how best to treat these costs depends on how well you understand the difference between a “sunk cost” and a “relevant (or future)” cost, so let’s start [...]