The General Services Administration hooked another big fish for its OASIS professional services contract.

The Defense Department’s “4th estate,” which includes the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Defense Information Systems Agency, the Defense Logistics Agency and other Defense agencies, signed a memorandum of understanding with GSA to commit to using OASIS for at least $500 million in professional services buys starting in January 2017. In return, DoD will see the fee it pays GSA drop from 0.75 percent to 0.10 percent the more it spends under OASIS.

DoD estimates the “4th estate” group of organizations spends about $6 billion a year on professional service contracts.

“OASIS has been employed successfully across the Department of Defense, particularly the military services, for some time. I am impressed with OASIS’ performance, in concert with the leadership emphasis within the Department of Defense on the effective management of professional services, to further mission and acquisition goals,” said Claire Grady, the director of Defense Procurement and Acquisition Policy, in a release. “This MOU not only paves the way for expanded usage by the 4th Estate, but also supports our commitment to cost-effectively meeting the warfighter’s needs by securing the lowest fees for usage. We look forward to the 4th Estate employing OASIS and OASIS SB as additional tools to meet their needs for professional services.”

The “4th estate” becomes the fourth DoD entity to sign an OASIS MOU with GSA. The Army and the Air Force committed to using the governmentwide acquisition contract to spend at least $500 million each for professional services in 2015 and 2013, respectively. The Navy’s Navy Air Systems Command signed a MOU in February, committing to spend $250 million over the course of the year in exchange for a fee reduction to 0.5 percent.

The latest MOU is almost identical to the ones signed by the Army and Navy, where DoD will “strongly encourage personnel to consider OASIS contracts for application procurements, via Defense Procurement Acquisition Policy (DPAP) policy alerts, other communications and ongoing partnership with GSA. However, each procurement conducted under the OASIS contracts will be supported by a determination of best procurement approach.”

GSA will provide training, scope reviews, share templates and best practices related to the use of OASIS.

In addition to the military, GSA also signed a similar MOU with the Homeland Security Department in June 2015 where it committed to spending $250 million a year under OASIS in return for lower fees.

Since GSA awarded OASIS in 2014 agencies have awarded 79 task orders worth more than $495 million under the unrestricted version of the contract, according to the agency’s dashboard. DoD by far has been the biggest user of the contract with the Air Force and the Army awarding a majority of  the task orders.

Under the small business version of OASIS, agencies have issued 240 task orders worth $789 million, according to GSA’s OASIS dashboard. The Air Force is by far the largest user of the small business version of OASIS, issuing 120 task orders.

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