NIH sunsets NITAAC GWACs as GSA absorbs IT buying

FedScoop reports that the NIH Information Technology Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC) is winding down every remaining governmentwide acquisition contract (GWAC) and moving its functions to the General Services Administration (GSA). The current vehicles, CIO-SP3, CIO-SP3 Small Business and CIO-CS, stop taking new orders on Oct. 29. New orders already face a period-of-performance restriction that bars them from running past Dec. 31, 2028, and the Department of Health and Human Services and NIH will cease NITAAC program functions after that date.

The context is the failed successor. CIO-SP4 was pitched as a roughly $50 billion, 10-year IT services vehicle. GAO said the solicitation contemplated about 305 to 510 indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity awards and sustained 93 protests by 64 offerors after finding NIH had not shown it reasonably evaluated phase-one proposals (https://www.gao.gov/press-release/gao-statement-protest-systems-plus-inc-b-419956-et-al). NIH later canceled the solicitation, citing President Trump’s procurement-consolidation order and a conclusion that CIO-SP4 had become redundant to existing GSA solutions.

For contracting officers, the Monday work is less dramatic than the procurement history. Existing NITAAC routes now have a stop date, new orders need the 2028 performance cap built in, and future IT buys should be checked against GSA vehicles. For contractors, the question is pipeline hygiene: which opportunities can still fit through CIO-SP3, CIO-SP3 Small Business or CIO-CS before Oct. 29, and which ones need a GSA path now.