The Office of Management and Budget wants details from agencies on how they are complying with President Trump’s 2025 executive order calling for them to prioritize commercially available products and services in acquisitions.
Efforts to shift agencies in that direction date back almost three decades, including the signing of the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 that requires agencies to give a preference to commercial offerings. Trump’s executive order sought to reinforce the policies outlined in FASA and further promote commercial acquisitions.
In a memo to agencies sent Friday, OMB Director Russ Vought writes that they have until May 4 to report every non-commercial contract award from April 2025 through September 2025. For any award exceeding $10 million, agencies must explain why they acquired a non-commercial offering and what they plan to do for the contract’s next option period.
Vought wrote that during the government’s 2024 fiscal year, more than two-thirds of total contract spend — as reported to the Federal Procurement Data System — was for non-commercial products and services. FPDS is the since-discontinued database that housed information on non-classified contract obligations across government.
That estimate includes $130 billion in what Vought called “non-commercial contracting for common services, such as professional support services, information technology and telecom services, and operation of facilities” that was acquired through cost-reimbursement contracts.
OMB is also putting in place a new consultation process for agencies if they plan a non-commercial buy, but sign-off from the agency’s political appointee responsible for acquisition is required before an agency can even go to OMB.
According to the memo, this means the agency’s chief acquisition officer must approve the request of the senior procurement executive to set up a non-commercial contract.
Those requests must include details on the contract’s duration and size, any market research efforts that informed the decision, whether the contract will be competed, cost analysis information, and other details on the requirements.
Requests must also include an “affirmative statement” from the agency’s political appointee overseeing acquisition that they support the career official’s determination to create a non-commercial contract.
Each agency has a policy official serving as a competition advocate, whose responsibilities include the promotion and advocacy of commercial acquisitions. As part of their reports to OMB due May 4, agencies must confirm whether that person is “at a level now lower than the head of the contracting activity or deputy (Senior Procurement Executive).”
OMB’s memo also details how the competition advocate is also responsible for making recommendations to SPE officials on maximizing commercial purchases, as well as working with the agency’s small business director on lowering barriers to entry for commercial providers and new entrants.
Competition advocates also work with the Procurement Committee on E-Government to review and improve data collection protocols, plus support the SPE in developing annual process reports for submission to OMB.
