US Navy Squeezes More Value From Budget Dollars

The US Naval military budget will vary from year-to-year, but its leadership is fixed in its mission to squeeze more value out of their Defense dollars by seizing cost-cutting opportunities and increasing operational efficiencies. SeaPort-e ® is a shining example where the US Navy succeeds in reducing operating costs and achieving faster, more effective procurement results to support our naval warfighters.

SeaPort-e ® was created in 2004 as part of a business process effort to reduce costs and maximize the efficiency of support service procurement for the US Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) and its affiliated warfare centers (United States Marine Corps, Military Sealift Command, Office of Naval Research, NAVAIR, SPAWAR, NAVFAC, and NAVSUP). The SeaPort-e ® procurement portal provides a standardized, efficient means of soliciting offers from amongst the diverse population of large and small businesses. All task orders are competitively solicited, awarded, and managed using the SeaPort-e ® platform in 22 functional areas including Engineering, Financial Management, and Program Management. It is one of the Navy’s critical platforms in supporting its agility, flexibility, and preparedness on the battlefront and provides an efficient and effective means of contracting for professional support services. SeaPort-e ® provides a secure automated procurement process that improves processing time, provides the ability to take advantage of numerous acquisition reform initiatives, including award term contracting, reverse auctioning, and electronic signatures, while still allowing Program Managers (PMs) the ability to select solutions that meet their requirements.

In August 2017, NAVSEA issued a summary of findings and analysis of SeaPort-e® cost and performance relative to other contract vehicles and developed a new iteration of SeaPort-e® called Next Generation SeaPort (SeaPort-NxG) which will offer further improvements to naval procurement practices based on lessons learned from SeaPort-e®’s original mission. Some of the new and improved criteria in SeaPort-NxG include consolidation of functional areas, elimination of zones which will increase access and visibility for all prime contractors, streamlining of existing list of vendors, and maximizing vendor competition. All of these changes are intended to achieve even more operational efficiencies and cost savings within procurement processes.

As a prime contractor to SeaPort-e®, St. Michael’s brings extensive experience and successful past performance in helping our military services, Defense agencies, and the Intelligence Community integrate and apply business, financial management, and technical support disciplines to achieve mission objectives. St. Michael’s helps government agencies become more successful through improved alignment between efficient business processes, sound financial management practices, and infusion of appropriate technologies.