Alston & Bird Government Contracts Blog

Small Business Administration (SBA)

Jeremy Silverman and Mark Wade, Jr. Published in the National Law Journal on Key Issues for Federal Contractor M&A Transactions

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Alston & Bird partner Jeremy Silverman and associate Mark Wade, Jr. were published in the November 2018 edition of The National Law Journal. Their article, “Three Hot Topics for Federal Contractor M&A Transactions,” takes a look at certain key legal and business issues that are unique in M&A transactions involving federal government contractors. Readers interested in how small-business considerations, audit risk, and foreign ownership considerations play a role in GovCon M&A transactions would find the insight provided in the article to be particularly relevant. The article [...]Read more

DOJ Crackdown on False Certification for Small Business Set-aside Award

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As discussed in prior blog posts, the DOJ over the last few years has continued to crack down on small-business contracting fraud, including “pass through” and “sham” contracting schemes. This trend has continued, and the DOJ recently cracked down on a subcontractor’s false certification for a government small-business set-aside program. On May 3, 2018, the DOJ announced that MassTech Inc. (MTI) and its CEO and CFO agreed to pay the United States $1.9 million to resolve allegations that MTI falsely certified it was a small business concern in order to obtain a Small Business Innovation [...]Read more

DOJ Continues to Crack Down on SBA Fraud

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On April 25, 2017, the DOJ announced that Michelle Cho, an officer of Far East Construction Corporation and other companies, received both prison time and civil penalties for her involvement as the mastermind of a fraudulent scheme to defraud the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) 8(a) program. Under this scheme, Cho would bid for set-aside contracts for small, disadvantaged businesses under the SBA 8(a) program. However, Cho’s companies would not perform this work. Instead, other large companies would perform this work and pay 3 percent of the proceeds to Cho’s companies. This is another [...]Read more

Women-Owned Small Businesses and Sole Source Contracts

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President Obama’s administration has made it a priority to meet the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) prime and subcontracting goals, which include metrics relating to the percentage of government contracts awarded to small businesses, women-owned small businesses (WOSB), small disadvantaged businesses, service disabled veteran-owned small businesses, and historically underutilized business zones. Although in fiscal years 2013 and 2014 government agencies met or exceeded their prime contracting goals for small businesses in general, they did not achieve their goals for WOSBs. One way to [...]Read more

Proposed Rule Requires Prime Contractor to Report Late or Reduced Payments to Small Business Subcontractors

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On January 20, 2016, the Department of Defense, General Services Administration, and NASA issued a proposed rule to amend the FAR and implement a section of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010. This proposed rule, which will implement Section 1334 of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 and the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) implementation of Section 1334, requires that, among other things, a prime contractor (1) notify the contracting officer, in writing, if the contractor makes a reduced or untimely payment to a small business subcontractor; and (2) disclose the reasons for the reduced [...]Read more