Academics – Page 3 – Public Procurement International

Webinar: Opening Online Marketplaces to Government Micro-Purchases — June 30, 2020

Tuesday, June 30, 2020 – 9:00 Pacific, 12:00 Eastern, 18:00 CET

https://youtu.be/Q3X-nfJc6hQ

Instructions on Using Auto-Captioning to View Translations in 100+ Languages

On Tuesday, June 30, 2020, at noon Eastern time, join a free hour-long webinar sponsored by George Washington University Law School’s Government Procurement Program to discuss GSA’s recent contract awards in the “commercial platforms” initiative — contracts estimated to be worth $6 billion annually, which were awarded to Amazon Business and two other online marketplaces.

Moderator Christopher Yukins (GWU) will introduce GSA’s “commercial platforms” initiative, and discuss potential challenges in implementation.
Robert Handfield, the Bank of America University Distinguished Professor of Supply Chain Management at North Carolina State University, and Director of the Supply Chain Resource Cooperative, will discuss how the government’s use of commercial platforms could improve the resilience of public supply chains in times of crisis.
Thomas Kull, professor of supply chain management at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, will review the training that will be needed under this initiative, as non-procurement professionals take on substantial purchasing responsibilities through the new platforms.
Andrea Patrucco, professor of project and supply chain management at Penn State Beaver, will discuss the potential impact of this initiative in state and local governments, and internationally.

Roger Waldron, Coalition for Government Procurement

Special guest Roger Waldron, president of the Coalition for Government Procurement (a leading industry association of commercial contractors who sell regularly to the federal government), will join the panel to discuss industry’s perspectives on GSA’s initiative. The Coalition has raised a number of concerns regarding the new commercial platforms initiative, including concerns regarding agency accountability, pricing, supply chain security, counterfeit goods, and market concentration.

Background Article

The panelists have co-authored a background article for the seminar in the Government Contractor; the piece was published in the days before GSA announced the contract awards. In the article, Professors Christopher Yukins (George Washington University), Robert Handfield (North Carolina State University), Thomas Kull (Arizona State University) and Andrea Patrucco (Penn State University Beaver) discuss key themes for the upcoming webinar: challenges in what is, in essence, a new method of procurement; improvements that the initiative will bring to supply chain resilience; training that will be needed for federal purchasers; and, the possible impacts on procurement markets, both in the United States and abroad.

GSA’s commercial platforms initiative, by opening online marketplaces to federal users’ micro-purchases, could have an enormous impact on broad portions of the federal marketplace. If the challenges can be met—if GSA’s commercial platforms initiative succeeds – it may serve as a model for other public purchasers across the United States, and across the globe.

Click to Register for Free Webinar

Webinar — Public Procurement in the Time of COVID-19: A Conversation Between Professor Michal Kania (U. Silesia/Poland) and Professor Christopher Yukins (GWU)

On June 5, 2020, Professors Michal Kania (University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, and a former Fulbright Scholar at GWU Law) and Christopher Yukins joined to discuss lessons learned in procurement from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Program Slides Download

Webinar – Trump’s Attacks on the Inspectors General: Presidential Prerogative or Punishing Critics?

June 3, 2020 – 9:00 Pacific / 12:00 Eastern / 18:00 CET

Register here

Program Slides

https://youtu.be/6oxRQi8fbJA

Program Chat – Recorded

GW Today story on the webinar

Join GW Law for another free hourlong webinar, on President Donald Trump’s abrupt removal of four inspectors general and his announcement that a fifth will be dismissed shortly. In the last few months Trump has:

Fired Michael Atkinson, inspector general for the U.S. intelligence community, who passed forward to Congress the whistleblower complaint regarding Ukraine that helped lead to Trump’s impeachment by the House of Representatives.

Removed Glenn Fine, acting inspector general of the Department of Defense, who was slated to chair the federal panel Congress created to oversee the Trump administration’s management of the $2 trillion COVID-19 stimulus package.

Ousted Christi Grimm as head of the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), after she published a report critical of the Trump administration’s preparations for the COVID-19 pandemic.

Notified Congress on Friday, May 15, 2020 that Steve Linick, Inspector General of the State Department, will be fired effective June 15, 2020 (after the statutory 30-day notice period), after Linick reportedly launched an inquiry into Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, according to a statement issued by the chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Rep. Eliot Engel.

On the same day, removed Mitch Behm, the acting Inspector General at the Department of Transportation, nominated Justice Department attorney Eric Soskin to be the permanent Inspector General, and designated Howard “Skip” Elliott as the Department’s Acting Inspector General. House Democrats had earlier requested an investigation into alleged favoritism shown by DOT in its dealings with the husband of Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who is seeking reelection. When acting inspector general Mitch Behm was replaced, Democrats voiced concern that his removal was prompted by the requested investigation involving Secretary Chao.

In-Depth Assessment: Background for the Webinar

An expert panel will discuss these actions against the inspectors general, which many have criticized as a collapse of the rule of law in Washington, opening the door to corruption in this and future administrations.

The panel will be moderated by Christopher Yukins, who teaches on anti-corruption in the Government Procurement Program at The George Washington University Law School, joined by:

Lisa Rein of the Washington Post will discuss President Trump’s recent actions against inspectors general across the federal government.

Jessica Tillipman teaches anti-corruption and government ethics law at The George Washington University Law School. She will discuss the role of inspectors general in the U.S. government under the Inspector General Act of 1978, and the balance that the Act draws between the power of the President and the independence of the inspectors general.

Clark Ervin, a partner at the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs who served as inspector general at three federal agencies during the administration of President George W. Bush, will discuss the role and independence of inspectors general historically, from the perspective of a former inspector general.

Noah Bookbinder is Executive Director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), and previously served as an attorney in the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section. He will discuss the pattern of Trump administration moves against inspectors general, the implications for potential corruption, and possible pathways to reform.

The webinar “Trump’s Attacks on the Inspectors General” had over 200 registrants from five continents

Webinar – Recovering from the Pandemic: European Initiatives, U.S. Perspectives – 14 May 2020

Thursday, May 14, 2020 – 9:00 Eastern US – 14:00 UK – 15:00 CET

Register here

The European Union has launched important initiatives in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in joint procurement and funding innovation to drive the recovery. In the United States, governments’ initial response was marred by fierce competition between federal and state governments for critical medical supplies. But U.S. governments have a long tradition of joint procurement (called “cooperative purchasing”) among governments, and in funding innovation through various initiatives including the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. International organizations, including the United Nations, have also played an important part in coordinating international relief efforts in procurement.

Join a free hourlong webinar held through George Washington University Law School’s Government Procurement Program and the University of Turin’s School of Management and Economics, to discuss the European Union and its member states’ initiatives, and U.S. and transnational perspectives. Experts will present the European initiatives, with commentary from U.S.-based businesspeople, attorneys and academics with long experience in cross-border procurement and innovation through public procurement.

https://youtu.be/HRSN9IGCpJU

Instructions on Using Auto-Captioning in 100+ Languages

Program Slides – PDF

Program Chat

Background Article for Webinar

**Registrants were from over thirty countries across five continents**

Panelists

Lucian Cernat, Chief Trade Economist, European Commission – welcoming remarks.

Bertrand Wert, PhD, Innovation Maker for the European Innovation Council, Accelerator, in the Business Acceleration Services team, where he has been in charge since 2015 of supporting innovative SMEs that are members of the Accelerator to gain access to public and private procurers of innovation. The EIC Accelerator programme supports the most innovative European SMEs, via grants and equity, to commercialise their innovative solutions and to look for investors. Bertrand worked from 2009 to 2015 for Directorate General GROW of the European Commission, in the team developing the “Innovation Union” strategy. Meanwhile, piloting demand-driven policy interventions, he managed several public procurement networks or “buyers’ groups” of innovation (Pre-Commercial Procurement & Public Procurement of Innovation).

Jekaterina Novikova is Innovation Policy Coordinator at the European Commission, Directorate General for Research and Innovation in the newly created European Innovation Council Task Force. Her areas of responsibility include innovation procurement and the connection of innovation ecosystems under the Horizon Europe program. An EU official since 2005, she spent five years in management positions implementing FP-7 and Horizon 2020 research projects. As an EU fellow, she spent the academic year 2018-2019 in the US, at the University of California, Berkeley where she conducted research on how the US government, universities and industry facilitate the transition of research results to market. Jekaterina is a Certified Chartered Accountant and holds an MA in European Affairs from Lund University, Sweden.

Ivo Locatelli, Senior Expert–Team Leader in innovation procurement at the European Commission (DG GROW (Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs)). Ivo has written on innovative procurement in the European Union, and will draw on his assessment of Europe’s experience to discuss next steps in joint procurement among the member states.

Stephan Corvers (s.corvers@corvers.com), managing director of Corvers Procurement Services (Netherlands), a private company which has been operating in the field of European procurement since 2000. Corvers has been involved in a wide range of procurement projects, relating to new markets, new products or services, new distribution channels, and new technology. Corvers is a contractor for the EAFIP-initiative of the European Commission.

Discussants

Benedetta Audia, United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) as Corporate Legal Advisor, where she heads the commercial and institutional law practice and has played a lead role in UNOPS’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic. She is an adjunct professor at George Washington University Law School, a Visiting Professor of Public International Law at LUISS Guido Carli University. She holds a Juris Doctor degree in Public International Law and two Masters Degrees (in Corporate Law and Legal Advanced World Studies).

Justin Kaufman, General Counsel, NASPO ValuePoint, leading U.S. publicly led “cooperative purchasing” vehicle, coordinated through the National Association of State Procurement Officers (NASPO) and used by all 50 states and hundreds of local governments across the United States. Justin has worked for many years in cooperative purchasing in the United States, and was a contributing author to Joint Public Procurement and Innovation: Lessons Across Borders (G. Racca & C. Yukins, eds., 2019).

Thomas Hendrix, Managing Partner, Decisive Point, a venture advisory and investment firm focused on advanced technology. Tommy works regularly with emerging companies in the SBIR program, building innovative solutions for government. Tommy served in the US Army for nearly 10 years as a Ranger, Green Beret, and Commander in a counter-terrorism response force. He holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and a BS in Law and Legal Systems from the United States Military Academy at West Point, and is a candidate for a Master of Studies in Law at George Washington University. Prior research he has done on improving innovation in government-funded research and development is here.

Moderators

Professors Gabriella Racca (University of Turin) and Christopher Yukins (George Washington University

A special note to the international procurement community — the World Bank needs your help in its worldwide survey of emergency procurement practices for the COVID-19 pandemic, available here

Past Webinars

Fighting Fraud in COVID-19 Sourcing – Webinar – April 9, 2020

A new threat has emerged in the pandemic: fraud in the supply chain for critical COVID-19 supplies. Governments the world over are fighting back against price gouging and defective supplies. What tools are available, and will they work? Join a free one-hour webinar with GW Law, as experts discuss these critical global developments in anti-corruption and procurement.

April 9, 2020, 9 am ET/15:00 CET/21:00 CST

Presented with the kind cooperation of the International Anti-Corruption Academy (IACA)

https://youtu.be/LbWhybyRAaw

Program Recording –Instructions on Using Auto-Captioning in 100+ Languages

Program Slides – 9 April 2020 Download

Program Chat Download

Register here

Panelists

Michael Bowsher QC – Monckton Chambers / King’s College, London (London)

Thomas Hendrix – GW Law / Decisive Point (New York)

Aris Georgopoulos — University of Nottingham (United Kingdom)

Rocco Burdo, Head, Analysis and Research Section, Intelligence Office, Anti-Fraud and Controls Department, Customs and Monopolies Agency (Italy)

Jessica Tillipman — GW Law (Washington)

Mihály Fazekas – Central European University (Budapest) DIGIWIST Report

Paul Whittaker – OECD (Paris) OECD – Corruption in Procurement

Moderators: Christopher Yukins, GW Law School (Washington); Jean-Bernard Auby (Professor emeritus, Sciences Po Law School (Paris)); Gabriella Racca (University of Turin); Laurence Folliot Lalliot (University of Paris Nanterre (joining from Dakar))

**Registrants from 40+ Countries and Territories**

Resources on COVID-19 and Public Procurement

Previous Webinars

Colloquium: What Happens If the U.S. Leaves the WTO Government Procurement Agreement?

Tuesday, February 18, 2020, 9 to 11 am – GWU Law School, Law Learning Center, 2028 G Street NW, Room LLC006

WTO Government Procurement Agreement Members and Observers

According to press reports, the Trump administration is mulling an executive order that would trigger U.S. withdrawal from the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA). This free colloquium will assess the United States’ potential withdrawal from the GPA, which would deprive U.S. suppliers of a key point of access to public procurement markets internationally — although the GPA, experts note, has set global standards and opened an estimate $1.7 trillion dollars annually in business opportunities. The United States could forfeit access to important public procurement markets in Canada and many other countries, and the United States could lose its leadership role (which dates back to World War II) in shaping global standards in public procurement, even as more countries (such as Brazil) are joining the GPA.

Colloquium will be held downstairs at the GWU Law Learning Center – 2028 G Street NW (photo: Google)

Resources

Flyer-Colloquium-GPA Withdrawal Download

Jean Heilman Grier, Consequences of Potential U.S. Withdrawal from GPA (Djaghe.com)

Robert Anderson & Christopher Yukins, Withdrawing the United States from the WTO Government Procurement Agreement (GPA): Assessing Potential Damage to the U.S. and Its Contracting Community, 62 Gov. Contractor para. 35 (Feb. 12, 2020)

Acetris Health LLC v. United States (Fed. Cir., Feb. 10, 2020) (Dyk, J.)

Panelists

Jean Heilman Grier is a leading internationally recognized expert on the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Government Procurement Agreement (GPA), bilateral and regional agreements, international trade negotiations and international procurement systems. She has more than 30 years of experience in international trade as a U.S. trade negotiator, lawyer, adviser and consultant, including as the government procurement negotiator for the U.S. government. For a decade, she represented the United States in the WTO Committee on Government Procurement where she played a leading role in the revision of the GPA and accessions to the Agreement. Since 2013, she has been the Trade Principal with Djaghe, LLC., where she advises and provides technical assistance to governments, international organizations, businesses and trade groups on international procurement and trade issues. She writes extensively on international procurement and other international trade topics, and maintains a blog, Perspectives on Trade, at http://trade.djaghe.com; there, she recently published a piece on the impacts that the United States leaving the GPA could have.

Robert Anderson is a teacher and independent researcher on matters relating to the multilateral trading system, competition policy and government procurement. He previously worked in the Secretariat of the World Trade Organization from 1997 through 2019, and held the position of Counsellor and Team Leader for Government Procurement and Competition Policy in the Organization from 2005 through 2019.

Current academic positions include that of Honorary Professor in the School of Law at the University of Nottingham (United Kingdom). Mr Anderson also is an external faculty member at the World Trade Institute, the University of Bern (Switzerland); the University of Rome Tor Vergata (Italy); and the Catholic University of Lyon (France). He also has been a guest speaker, on multiple occasions, in relevant courses of the George Washington University Law School (United States).

Roundtable Participants: Michael Bowsher QC (Monckton Chambers, London) – Andrea Sundstrand (University of Stockholm) – Pascal Friton (Blomstein, Berlin) – Paul Lalonde (Dentons, Toronto) – Colette Langos (University of Adelaide) – Christopher Yukins (GWU Law School)

Program information: Cassandra Crawford, ccrawford@law.gwu.edu

GWU Law Supports Student Submissions to Law Journals for Publication

For GWU Law students interested in publishing excellent papers, the Law School maintains a special service for students, described below, excerpted from an email from the head of the Law Library, Associate Dean Scott Pagel:

George Washington University Law School, Washington, DC

I am writing to share information about a new service that the Law School will be offering to our students and recent graduates, effective immediately.

In order to promote student scholarship and to subsidize student efforts to be published, the Dean has agreed to permit students to submit a manuscript to up to 25 journals using the Law School’s Scholastica account. This offer also will be extended to alumni/alumnae for a period of six months following their graduation. As those of [the faculty] who use Scholastica know, it charges for each submission. This is where [faculty] assistance is required.

In order for a student to participate in this program, she must have a full-time faculty member as a “sponsor” for the manuscript. The faculty member will be expected to read the manuscript and ascertain whether it is likely to be accepted for publication by a journal. The faculty member also will be expected to meet with the student to discuss which journals are appropriate targets for submission of the manuscript. Please note that students are not limited in the number of manuscripts that they may submit, but they must obtain sponsorship from a full-time faculty member for each manuscript.

[After a full-time faculty member has discussed the manuscript] with the student, [the faculty member should] simply send [Dean Pagel] her name and email address and [he] will take it from there. [He] will add the student to [the] Scholastica list, contact the student, and monitor use of the service.

The full policy is downloadable here:

Scholastica-Policy Download

Students in the GWU Law Government Procurement Program also may want to contact the procurement-focused journals listed on our program page, https://www.law.gwu.edu/government-procurement-law. And as always, Mary Kate Hunter, the lead librarian for the program, is a wonderful resource too.

Request Denied by GAO for Documents in Pending Protest Regarding GSA “Electronic Marketplaces” Procurement

On January 15, 2020, Overstock.com, Inc., a competitor in the pending U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) procurement for “electronic marketplaces” reportedly protested the reissued (and revised) solicitation at the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Per GAO’s rules on the public availability of records, 4 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 81, Professor Yukins submitted a formal request to GAO for electronic versions of the redacted materials filed in the referenced pending bid protest (attached). These records were requested so that information and analysis regarding the subject procurement – a multi-billion dollar procurement to open commercial electronic marketplaces to federal users – can be made available to the public. If these records are not released, key information on this major procurement may be blocked from the public for roughly three months – the 100-day period for a GAO bid protest to be decided.

On January 22, 2020, GAO denied the request, saying that it is estimated that the documents will not be available until the proceedings are concluded, projected to be on or about April 24, 2020, over three months later. In practical terms, this means that the thousands of vendors and customers which need to prepare for the new electronic markets to be opened by GSA’s procurement may need to wait months for information on the ongoing procurement and protest — even though that information (because redacted) is otherwise publicly releasable.

Editor’s Note: On January 24, 2020, the Federal News Network published an op-ed by Roger Waldron of the Coalition for Government Procurement which concluded: “. . . there are broad implications for the procurement system associated with the e-Marketplace acquisition, and those implications extend into other areas of importance, like supply chain security, socioeconomic programs, and the protection of proprietary data. Yukins is right. Absent the release of these [GAO protest] records, ‘key information on this major procurement may be blocked from the public for roughly three months – the 100-day period for a GAO bid protest to be decided.’ So too, from the perspective of Coalition members, it highlights that more review and reflection on the acquisition is needed. “

Request for Documents- 20 Jan 2020 Download

GAO Acknowledgement – 21 Jan 2020 Download

GAO Denial of Request – 22 Jan 2020 Download

ABA Committees To Hold Joint Meeting on Developments in International Debarment – February 13, 2020 – Call in

Jessica Tillipman, GWU Law School – Co-chair, ABA SIL Anti-Corruption Committee

On February 13, 2020, at 12:00 noon ET, the American Bar Association (ABA) Section of International Law (SIL) Anti-Corruption Committee will join with the ABA Public Contract Law Section (PCLS) Suspension and Debarment Committee, for an informal lunchtime session on developments in international debarment. The session will be moderated by Assistant Dean Jessica Tillipman, George Washington University Law School, Washington DC.

Christopher Yukins, George Washington University Law School (who co-teaches courses on anti-corruption with Dean Tillipman), will discuss emerging international models for debarment, and the impact that new electronic marketplaces may have on debarment globally. With regard to the U.S. experience, he has drafted a book chapter with John Pachter and Jessica Tillipman, for a forthcoming book on compliance by Cambridge University Press. Professor Yukins has also co-written a piece with Professor Michal Kania (U. Silesia – Katowice), comparing debarment in the United States and the European Union.

Chris Yukins-International Models-Materials Download

Pascal Friton, a partner in the BLOMSTEIN firm, Berlin, will discuss how the European Union’s member states are addressing exclusion and debarment, drawing on a piece he presented at the Thomson Reuters Government Contracts Year in Review in February 2019. He also will be speaking on the afternoon of Tuesday, February 18, 2020 at this year’s Year in Review conference.

Collin Swan, of the World Bank’s Office of Suspension & Debarment, will discuss his office’s debarment survey and the office’s ongoing research into other debarment systems (beyond the United States and the World Bank). See his FCPA Blog post on the survey.

World Bank – Suspension & Debarment Survey – Pilot Results (2019) Download

Additional resources

Grace Sullivan, a third-year student at the George Washington University Law School, recently won first prize in the Public Contract Law Journal annual writing contest for her note (which was also accepted for publication in the Journal). Her note analyzes three case studies of foreign contractors debarred by the U.S. government: Chinese telecommunications giants ZTE and Huawei, and Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky. Ms. Sullivan will be presenting on her note at the March 2020 ABA PCLS Federal Procurement Institute in Annapolis, MD.

Dial-in Information:

If you are calling from the US, here are your instructions:

US Dial-in Number (local toll): (515) 606-5440

Access Code: 509353

If you are calling from outside the US, here are your instructions:

International local-toll dial-in numbers: https://www.freeconferencecall.com/wall/sil_anticorruption/

Link to connect to call via computer: join.freeconferencecall.com/sil_anticorruption

Colloquium – Transnational Procurement – Turin, Italy – February 5, 2020

Professor Gabriella Racca hosted a colloquium on transnational procurement at the University of Turin on February 5, 2020. The discussion focused on a new book, Joint Public Procurement and Innovation: Lessons Across Borders (G. Racca & C. Yukins, eds., 2019). Further information is included in the accompanying flyer.

Flyer – Torino Colloquium Download

Gabriella Racca & Chris Yukins-Innovation Book-Presentation Download