Category: Press Releases

Each year, the Small Business Administration (SBA) produces its Small Business Procurement Scorecard, which aims to assess the performance of federal agencies towards achieving their small business contracting goals, provide valid and reliable data on federal contracting with an emphasis on transparency, as well as analyze and report agency level and government-wide progress towards the goals. For fiscal year 2017, the SBA revised the methodology for the scorecard, and has since conducted a rigorous program evaluation to assess the effectiveness of this change and the scorecard overall in increasing small business opportunities and improving the ability of federal agencies to meet their small business procurement goals.

Optimal Solutions Group LLC (Optimal) found that the change in the scorecard’s methodology did not result in many changes to small business procurement practices at federal agencies for prime contracting. No changes were observed in indicators of small business opportunities or small business prime contracting dollars after the methodology change. However, the scorecard overall has had a strong positive relationship with indicators of small business prime contracting opportunities, which, in turn, have a positive association with small business contracting dollars. The study conducted by Optimal also found that agencies would like for the SBA to provide guidance on navigating Category Management while promoting small businesses. Overall, the study found partnership and understanding between agencies and the SBA to be the most crucial factor in the entire process of setting and meeting goals to improve small business contracting opportunities in the federal government.

While the findings of the study shed light on the nature of the relationship between the scorecard methodology change and the scorecard overall on small business opportunities and contracting dollars, the study could not provide definite findings of these relationships due to data limitations and methodological challenges.

Visit Small Business Procurement Scorecard for more information.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and technical assistance firm that stands out for its quantitative expertise and innovative approaches to provide rigorous, data-driven research and technical assistance to government agencies, corporations, nonprofit organizations and philanthropic foundations. Located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park, Optimal is a leader in driving real-time public policy research. Optimal has 60+ employees, including multidisciplinary researchers with backgrounds in economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics, information management and entrepreneurship. Optimal has four research centers—Health, Education, Housing and Workforce Development, and Social Policy—as well as an International Practice, Analytics Group, and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) offers tools, solutions, and resources to address manufacturer’s diverse challenges and opportunities. Optimal Solutions Group LLC (Optimal) will provide access to a manufacturing data analysis and modeling tool or service . This tool/service will put dynamic and relevant manufacturing data in the hands of the MEP Centers, which helps with efficiency in serving their local markets.

The goal with this tool/service is to gain granularity in understanding of U.S. manufacturing –– from varying industry levels, to varying geographical levels, to different occupational levels –– and to understand data trends in the U.S. manufacturing sector at various levels of detail. Being able to understand any changes that may be coming to the U.S. manufacturing sector and its subcomponents and being able to prepare for those changes are of importance to the NIST MEP.

Optimal will provide a data tool/service that is hosted on a web-based platform that can be accessed via a site license, which will allow NIST MEP and the national network of MEP Center users to quickly gain access to aggregated manufacturing relevant data from multiple sources and use that data to analyze different aspects of U.S. manufacturing, including changes in establishment counts, changes in employment numbers, and supply chain identification and mapping, etc. Optimal will identify and populate the data. This data will then be aggregated in the tool/service and used to populate analyses and reports, which can also be automatically generated and downloaded from the tool/service. Work is set to begin on this project in October 2021.

Optimal previously provided evaluation support for NIST MEP’s Business to Business Network Pilot Project.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and technical assistance firm that stands out for its quantitative expertise and innovative approaches to provide rigorous, data-driven research and technical assistance to government agencies, corporations, nonprofit organizations and philanthropic foundations. Located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park, Optimal is a leader in driving real-time public policy research. Optimal has 60+ employees, including multidisciplinary researchers with backgrounds in economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics, information management and entrepreneurship. Optimal has four research centers—Health, Education, Housing and Workforce Development, and Social Policy—as well as an International Practice, Analytics Group, and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center.

The Historically Underutilized Business Zone (HUBZone) program, part of the Small Business Administration (SBA), helps small businesses in low-income metropolitan or rural areas with high poverty and unemployment rates gain preferential access to federal procurement opportunities. Businesses obtain HUBZone certification in part by employing staff who live in a HUBZone and maintaining a “principal office” in one of these specially designated areas.

Optimal Solutions Group LLC (Optimal) evaluated the economic impact of the HUBZone program and found it has a moderate impact on the 30 counties studied. Optimal used an input-output model to assess the inflow of economic activity brought on by federal contracts won by HUBZone businesses to the distressed HUBZone communities. To estimate the program’s effect on each state and selected counties, the study estimated the total employment, earnings, value added, as well as gross output impacts of the identified contract awards to HUBZone firms.

Through the HUBZone program, federal procurement spending is directed into underutilized areas. Although the findings from the 30 selected counties are not representative of all contract awards to the universe of HUBZone firms, the findings are consistent in terms of the impact of the contract awards to HUBZone firms on large and small local economies. The HUBZone program has a moderate impact on all 30 counties in terms of value added and employment supported by contract awards to HUBZone firms.

Visit HUBZone program for more information.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and technical assistance firm that stands out for its quantitative expertise and innovative approaches to provide rigorous, data-driven research and technical assistance to government agencies, corporations, nonprofit organizations and philanthropic foundations. Located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park, Optimal is a leader in driving real-time public policy research. Optimal has 60+ employees, including multidisciplinary researchers with backgrounds in economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics, information management and entrepreneurship. Optimal has four research centers—Health, Education, Housing and Workforce Development, and Social Policy—as well as an International Practice, Analytics Group, and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center.

The Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Boots to Business (B2B) program is offered free of charge and helps transition service members from military to civilian life through entrepreneurship education and training. During the COVID-19 pandemic, an in-person course rapidly transitioned to an instructor-led virtual course. A new study by Optimal Solutions Group LLC (Optimal) examines the implementation of the virtual delivery and the course quality results.

The study focuses on a two-day classroom course, “Introduction to Entrepreneurship,” part of a curriculum that provides foundational knowledge required to develop a business plan and introduces participants to available SBA resources. The transition of this course to a virtual environment allowed continued service to transitioning military, and the virtual delivery also increased access to those otherwise underserved by removing barriers to the physical location and in-person requirements of the course. Due to the rapid and unplanned transition, the SBA did not prescribe curriculum, delivery, or facilitation instruction changes to its resource partners. Optimal’s evaluation will help increase the SBA’s understanding of how it can effectively implement the B2B course in a virtual environment. The generalizable findings of the study will be used to inform programming and process improvements to increase the program’s effectiveness and may inform decision-making for future SBA virtual training offerings.

Optimal’s evaluation analyzes raw data from the course quality survey and performance data in order to answer evaluation questions such as, “How can the B2B course be most effectively implemented in a virtual environment?” and “Which best practices from the review of the literature and findings can the SBA incorporate to improve the delivery of this virtual training?” Results from the data analysis will be presented to the SBA in a detailed report in 2022.

Visit SBA’s Boots to Business program for more information.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and technical assistance firm that stands out for its quantitative expertise and innovative approaches to provide rigorous, data-driven research and technical assistance to government agencies, corporations, nonprofit organizations and philanthropic foundations. Located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park, Optimal is a leader in driving real-time public policy research. Optimal has 60+ employees, including multidisciplinary researchers with backgrounds in economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics, information management and entrepreneurship. Optimal has four research centers—Health, Education, Housing and Workforce Development, and Social Policy—as well as an International Practice, Analytics Group, and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center.

The federal government established the 8(a) program to improve the capacity of small businesses owned by the socially and economically disadvantaged members of society by creating a level playing field for providing goods and services to the federal government and increasing the supply base of qualified businesses owned by such members of society.

The Small Business Administration partnered with Optimal Solutions Group LLC to conduct a rigorous program evaluation to assess the performance of the 8(a) program by examining the market for goods and services supplied by 8(a) businesses and those demanded by federal agencies. The study found that there is overlap between the industries that federal agencies buy goods and services from and those in which 8(a) businesses operate. However, the results show that a change in spending in those industry sectors by federal agencies would largely not differentially affect contracting dollars to 8(a) businesses. The study identified the strongest relationships of any agency procurement practices with 8(a) spending with the use of 8(a) set-aside and sole source vehicles. Spending through these vehicles have a very strong positive relationship with increasing 8(a) prime contracting dollars.

The results also show that of the 8(a) businesses that were successful in obtaining a first prime federal contract, those that had more experience in federal contracting, had a higher concentration of federal earnings in their overall revenue, and had more set-aside and sole source contracts were likely to receive higher prime federal contracting dollars. Comparing the performance of businesses that joined the 8(a) program to a group of non-8(a) businesses statistically matched based on their characteristics, the study found that 8(a) businesses were more likely to obtain a prime federal contract in the first 4 years after joining the program compared to the non-8(a) businesses. Moreover, the results show that businesses in the 8(a) program obtain prime federal contracts at a faster rate than non-8(a) businesses.

Visit 8(a) program for more information.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and technical assistance firm that stands out for its quantitative expertise and innovative approaches to provide rigorous, data-driven research and technical assistance to government agencies, corporations, nonprofit organizations, and philanthropic foundations. Located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park, Optimal is a leader in driving real-time public policy research. Optimal has 60+ employees, including multidisciplinary researchers with backgrounds in economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics, information management and entrepreneurship. Optimal has four research centers—Health, Education, Housing and Workforce Development, and Social Policy—as well as an International Practice, Analytics Group, and Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center.

The Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Microloan Program makes direct loans to qualified nonprofit, quasi-governmental and tribal mediators that, in turn, lend working capital for job creation, equipment, and material purchases. This program is essential for small businesses who do not qualify for traditional business loans and who have historically been underrepresented in the business community across a number of industries. The SBA also provides funds for microloan borrower technical assistance in the form of trainings in management, marketing, and business growth planning with the primary objective of sustaining and preserving the likelihood the businesses will succeed.

In order to examine the program’s activities and outputs that will impact the trajectory of business growth, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC (Optimal), is conducting a data collection with a nationally representative sample of small businesses in the Spring of 2021. Data will be collected from lending institutions and borrowers to examine the types of services and technical assistance small businesses are receiving from lending institutions. The data analysis will investigate the quality and fidelity of the services and how small business owners are utilizing these supports to build successful business practices and grow their businesses. Given that retrospective data will be collected from both lending institutions and business owners, data related to the current COVID-19 pandemic will be critical in assessing the impact of the virus on business success and failures, along with other factors affecting business growth that are within the control of lending institutions and business borrowers.

Over the next 18 months, Optimal will work with SBA to develop and conduct the evaluation that will examine and analyze key performance metrics, business practices, support services, and the factors that impact the growth outcomes for small businesses participating as borrowers in the Microloan Program.

Find out more about the Microloan Program.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC 

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park. 

The SBA’s Regional Innovation Cluster (RIC) Initiative, launched in September 2010, promotes and supports U.S. regional clusters—geographically concentrated groups of connected businesses, suppliers, service providers, and similar institutions in an industry or field. Clusters act as a networking hub to convene resources for small businesses. This then helps small businesses in navigating funding, procurement, and supply-chain opportunities in their specific industry.

Currently, the RIC Initiative provides funding to 14 industry clusters. The SBA is pursuing three aims in each of these clusters. The first goal is to increase the chances for small businesses to participate within the clusters. Accordingly, the SBA’s initiative selected clusters to receive funding partially based on their ability and potential to provide industry-specific assistance to small businesses within their regions. The second goal is to enhance economic development and growth in the regions in which the 14 selected clusters are operating. The third goal is to promote innovation in the clusters’ focused industries, which include geospatial technology products, water technologies, retail management and logistics, marine science technologies, autonomous and unmanned systems, defense technologies (e.g., surveillance, small spacecrafts, and cybersecurity), fuel cells and energy storage, smart grid technologies, wood products, bioscience technologies, and flexible electronics.

The 14 industry clusters consist of seven long-serving and seven new sites. The SBA sought help from Optimal, a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm, in developing an overall evaluation framework for the SBA’s RIC Initiative, and assistance in designing new or clarifying existing measures and metrics.

Find out more about the SBA’s Regional Innovation Cluster Initiative.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC 

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park.  Optimal employees have varied backgrounds in such fields as public policy, computer science, data science, economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics and information management. 

This study helped SBA in improving the program enactment of Emerging Leaders (e200) Training and Mentoring Initiative by identifying strategies to improve program participation and stakeholder engagement. It also identified the factors affecting the business revenue and business survival rates of the businesses poised for growth in historically challenged communities.

Optimal assisted in developing the overall evaluation frameworks for SBA’s Emerging Leaders Initiative and suggested new or clarified existing measures and metrics, which will assist the Office of Performance Management and Chief Financial Officer in meeting the goals of SBA. These goals include job growth, business growth, etc. Optimal has previously evaluated the Emerging Leaders Initiative from 2012–19, and those findings were used to assess the efficacy of the Emerging Leaders program sites.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC 

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park.  Optimal employees have varied backgrounds in such fields as public policy, computer science, data science, economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics and information management. 

The Small Business Administration’s (SBA) 8(a) Business Development Program grants participants access to set-aside or sole source contracts, a business opportunity specialist, the right to enter a mentor-protégé program, and other benefits.

The goal of the Evaluation of 8(a) Certified Firms is to better understand the market for goods and services demanded by federal agencies and those supplied by 8(a) businesses. The evaluation examined the ability of 8(a) businesses to obtain federal contracts as they progress from the initial development stage to the transitional stage of the program, as well as how they fare once they graduate.

Optimal, a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm, continues to build upon its large body of work with the SBA and other workforce development projects to provide SBA with the information needed to serve the 8(a) participants in the most effective and efficient way possible.

Find out more about SBA’s 8(a) Business Development Program

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC 

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park.  Optimal employees have varied backgrounds in such fields as public policy, computer science, data science, economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics and information management. 

The annual federal procurement scorecard assesses the extent to which federal agencies reach their small business contracting goals, which Congress develops. The SBA is responsible for ensuring that small businesses participate in the government-wide goal, which is established annually at the statutory levels, and that the reporting agencies’ achievements are close to reaching the goals.

The SBA made revisions to the scorecard method to address requirements specified in the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2016. The Government Accountability Office recommended that the SBA complete the design and implementation of a thorough evaluation of the Small Business Procurement Scorecard. Optimal conducted evaluations to assess the effectiveness of the revised scorecard in measuring agency performance and promoting small business procurement opportunities and provided the SBA with the information they needed to best serve the small businesses of the United States.

Find out more about SBA’s procurement scorecard.

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Optimal Solutions Group, LLC 

Founded in 2000, Optimal Solutions Group, LLC, is a nonpartisan public policy research and data analytics firm located at the University of Maryland’s Discovery District in College Park.  Optimal employees have varied backgrounds in such fields as public policy, computer science, data science, economics, education, health, housing, sociology, statistics and information management.