A huge problem that newcomers face when trying to enter the federal market place is that it is enormously difficult to find end users (the person with money who needs what a company is selling). End users typically want to keep a low profile to avoid an onslaught of sales calls, so they have a natural tendency to stay with the vendors they already know.

A centralized database providing information on existing contracts would go a long way toward opening the competitive process. In September, 2006 Congress passed a new law that would require the creation of a public contract awards database. Ideally, the new database would provide a summary of what was purchased and who the end users and official buyers are for each awarded contract. This new law would be the single biggest step ever taken to open the federal market. The General Services Administration (GSA) operates a similar database. The current database is virtually useless because the data is not timely and does not tell a vendor what product or service was procured.

Trying to piggyback a new database on the back of the current one would likely result in years of foot dragging. It would also most likely produce an ineffective, inefficient patchwork of incompatible data entry and search software programs. The current database should be kept operational until a brand new system is up and fully running, at which point the old one should be consigned to the database graveyard.

In a perfect world, the new database would be developed within GSA. Unfortunately, this is not likely to happen. The database's development will probably have to be contracted out but the contractor handling the project should not be allowed to control the data (as is the case with the current contract award database). In other words, the contractor should not have any rights whatsoever to the awards data.

Any and all regulations implemented in furtherance of the new database should contain rigid and unbending rules about publishing contract awards. From our perspective, the three most important issues to be addressed are as follows:

• Contracting officers should be required to post all new contact awards of $25,000 or more within twenty-four hours of award.
• A summary of what was purchased and the place of contract performance should be part of the record. The bureaucracy will resist publishing a summary of what was purchased; they will turn to "coding systems" rather than a simple description.
• The names of the end user of the product or service and the contracting officer should be published, including full contact data (telephone number, e-mail address, and mailing address). The new law says the "program source" must be published for each award. Program source could mean a lot of things and we can virtually guarantee that it will not mean the name and contact data for the end user. The lack of identifying information for the end user and a meaningful description of what was purchased are two of the biggest drawbacks to currently-published contract award data.

The bureaucracy will have a thousand reasons why these suggestions can't be implemented. In particular, federal employees do not want to publish the name of the end user because end users would receive too many phone calls from companies trying to penetrate the insider-driven market. But this is exactly what Congress would like to happen.

Those in the federal government will argue that there may be many end users for a particular contract. While this is true, the identity of the project officer or the contracting officer's official representative (the terms are synonymous) is part of the contract itself and this person is the primary end user. He or she is the person who should be identified in the new contract awards database.

An effective, online contract award database is not the Holy Grail everyone is looking for in federal sales. There just isn't one and the best that can be done is to allow everyone easy access to what has been bought in the past. An awards database with free, public access would open the $360 billion market to public scrutiny. It would go a long way toward creating a more level playing field for newcomers, particularly small businesses. And it would save billions of dollars in two ways. Taxpayer dollars would be saved due to increased competitiveness in the market. And it might make a dent in the pork barrel projects that are larded onto each year's appropriations bills. Transparency is one of the few tools that can be used to improve government efficiency and effectiveness.

The new database law calls for an operating database in about two years. So what do businesses entering the federal market do in the mean time?

Conduct Internet research to find end users who buy what you sell.