Kristen Smith 
The Defense Intelligence Agency has consolidated three open-source intelligence contracts into a single Enterprise-Wide OSINT Knowledge Support task order valued at more than $94 million. According to a special notice published on SAM.gov on Friday, the EWOKS task order, which has one base year and four option years, will be competed under the agency’s Solutions for Intelligence Analysis—a.k.a. SIA—3 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract vehicle.
In the binding determination document, DIA said EWOKS will provide labor essential to the safe collection, access, storage, exploitation and dissemination of open-source information, including support for technologies for gathering publicly and commercially available information.
It noted that the consolidation expands the scope of services to include providing specialists across eight technical OSINT sub-disciplines, weapons of mass destruction-focused OSINT collection support, librarian services, data science services, and classification and declassification support.
The task order is intended to support OSINT needs across the entire defense intelligence enterprise.
Why Did DIA Opt for a Bundled Approach?
DIA’s Open-Source Intelligence Center concluded that merging three separate OSINT support contracts is the most efficient acquisition approach. The agency said the action will bring benefits driven by lower administrative costs and improved oversight compared with managing multiple standalone efforts.
It also stated that market research across internal vehicles and General Services Administration schedules found that only SIA 3 could support the full requirements for the new enterprise OSINT model. Sixteen SIA 3 vendors indicated they could perform the work.
