The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has issued a solicitation notice for a 10-year, $25 billion, professional services contract known as VECTOR, which will be set aside for service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses.

According to the Nov. 8 notice:

A solicitation is scheduled for release by mid to late November with proposals due about 30 days later. Awards are planned for January.

The contract will include six to eight service groups for Oversight, Improvement, Analyses, Training, Outreach, Supply Chain, Operations Maintenance and Logistics and Healthcare Management. Each service group will have about 10 contractors.

The evaluation criteria include a tiered approach that first favors companies who have teamed or subcontracted with other veteran-owned businesses first, then those who have teamed or subcontracted with small businesses, and finally those that have partnered with large businesses.

VA has spent about $7.3 billion on knowledge-based services in fiscal 2012 through 2016, according to Bloomberg Government data. That includes about $3 billion to all small-business categories and about $1.8 billion to businesses that are exclusively veteran-owned. Those spending levels suggest VECTOR’s $25 billion could be inflated, given that orders on the vehicle will only be addressable by veteran-owned businesses.

Bloomberg Government expects most professional services spending to be dominated by a few contract vehicles, including OASIS and the Professional Services Schedule contracts at the General Services Administration and most Defense Department spending going to the Seaport-e and RS3 vehicles.

VECTOR will probably be important for small businesses but is unlikely to disrupt top contractors including Lockheed Martin Corp., Boeing Co., Northrop Grumman Corp.and Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corp., which pull in most of the $64 billion spent annually by the government on knowledge-based services.

~from Daniel Snyder, Bloomberg Government