Bright Polarization Entangled Photon Source

This is a Notice of Proposed Contract Action under the FAR Part 12 Acquisition of Commercial Products and Commercial Services. Notice is for information only; a solicitation will not be issued. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR QUOTATION. No contract will be awarded on the basis of offers received in response to this notice. The associated North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code is 334515 with a small business size standard of 750 employees.

The Government requires the procurement of a Bright Polarization-Entangled Photon Source and intends to negotiate a sole-source award with Oz Optics Limited, 219 Westbrook Rd, Ottawa, Canada, KOA 1L0, who is the exclusive provider of the required branded products in the United States.

The Government requires the specific item detailed below:

Item: Bright Polarization-Entangled Photon Source

Part Number: BHEPS-1000-3A3A-1550-9/125

Quantity: 1

Description: A turn-key, alignment-free bright source operating at room temperature. The unit must generate high-quality polarization-entangled photon pairs within a narrow telecom bandwidth centered at 1550 nm, using a type-2 waveguide. The coincidence rate must be controllable via a built-in manual pump attenuator. The photon pairs shall be generated through a Sagnac interferometric configuration and directly injected into two single-mode output fibers without using a wavelength splitter to ensure the highest coupling efficiency after passing through built-in pump-noise removal filters. These output ports must be accessed through two FC/APC adaptors installed on the front panel, delivering the photon pairs within 9/125 μm single-mode fibers.

The Government has determined that Oz Optics Limited is the only company that can satisfy the minimum technical specifications for this requirement. Specifically, the required source must provide: a uniquely high number of entangled pairs per second suitable for experiments over lossy, real-world links; a turn-key, alignment-free solution for use in field environments; and be full compatibility with the suite of Oz Optics automated rotation optics and tomography modules already present in AFRL laboratories to ensure equipment uniformity. As Oz Optics Limited is the only vendor that meets all three of these critical requirements and represents itself as the exclusive provider of its branded products, a sole-source award is contemplated, as mentioned above.

This is a notice of proposed contract action and not a request for competitive proposals; however, all responsible sources may submit a capability statement or proposal, which shall be considered by the agency. All inquiries should be sent by email to jennifer.calandra@us.af.mil. Responses must be submitted by the date/time listed on the notice. Any response to this notice must show clear and convincing evidence that competition would be advantageous to the Government in future procurements.

Responses received will be evaluated; however, a determination by the Government not to compete the proposed procurement based upon responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. The Government anticipates an award date on or before 30 April 2026.

A Sole Source Justification will be attached to the subsequent Notice of Award in accordance with applicable regulation.