Enhance Business Consulting · Internal, not for primes
The plan
For Jason, Bobby and Bobby's agent · do not forwardThe plan, explained simply
For Bobby: the plan in plain English, starting with a 30-second version you can say to Kimberly's husband, then more detail one step at a time.
Our angle: knowledge work with AI
Enhance does the paperwork side of a contract (reports, minutes, research, drafts) in a fraction of the hours, so your bid is cheaper or your margin is bigger.
Decided 2026-10-06.
- Now
Jason joins Enhance as an employee
Once Enhance bids as the main contractor, at least half the work must come from its own employees. An employee counts toward that half; an outside contractor counts against it. It also makes the AI capability the firm's own, which is what VA and primes evaluate.
- Written agreement on who owns the tools Jason builds (Jason owns, Enhance licenses), kept simple so Bobby clearly controls the company
- Bobby keeps every company decision: pricing, what to chase, hiring. The veteran certification depends on it
- Part-time payroll to start; wages are owed for hours worked even before a contract pays
- One-hour attorney review of the agreement
- Next 90 days
Pitch the primes, with a pilot
Pick the three firms most likely to say yes and show them this page. The pitch is their margin: on a fixed-price job, every hour Enhance's AI saves their staff is money they keep. Offer a free or low-cost pilot of 2 or 3 reports on real, public VA requirements.
- Offer the pilot to the PRIME (a private company). Never offer free work to VA: federal law (31 U.S.C. 1342) bars agencies from accepting volunteer services
- A subcontract earns a past-performance reference letter from the prime, which agencies accept for future bids
- Ongoing
Grow into any work AI does well
Every new service has to pass three tests before Enhance offers it.
- Mostly documents built from public or client-provided data (market research, price research, rule-change tracking, first drafts of work statements and checklists)
- No need for the agency's internal systems on our own machines; that data must stay on agency-approved tools
- A person can check the output quickly; contractors draft, government staff decide
- 2027
Compete as the main contractor
VA's two acquisition-support orders end 2027-09-21 (NCO 7) and 2027-09-28 (VA's central office). By then Enhance needs what every firm on this page already has.
- A GSA schedule contract (takes months to get)
- 2 or 3 senior federal acquisition people
- Past-performance references from the subcontract work
- Option: SBA's mentor-protégé program, where a large contractor mentors Enhance and the two can bid together while still counting as small
- Later, maybe
Sell the research on its own
Nobody has asked to buy it yet, so it is not a priority. If primes or other veteran-owned firms start asking, it becomes a product.
Side lane: NYC Commercial Corridor Resilience Program
Decided 2026-10-07 · NYC Department of Small Business Services RFP 80126P0020 · $450,000 a year · proposals due 2026-10-15 2:00 PM
What the city is buying: The city will hire one organization to run a year-long program for community business groups (business improvement districts, local development corporations, merchants' associations) in neighborhoods hit by Hurricane Ida. The winner hires 6-10 Fellows who work inside those groups, runs in-person disaster-preparedness workshops, and helps each group write and carry out a resilience plan. The money is federal disaster-recovery funding passed through the city.
The steps, and why each one
- 2026-10-07 to 10-08
Contact the likely bidders, in order
Coro first, then CRE, Van Alen, Support Center and LISC NY (list below). Also ask Bobby's uncle Kenneth Knuckles for introductions; he used to run the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone.
Why: We can only join a team that is already bidding. With 8 days left, a warm introduction beats a cold email.
- By 2026-10-10
Bobby sends the offer; Jason starts a draft targeting map
One email per organization, from Bobby's Enhance address, with the capability statement attached.
Why: A bidder needs a few days to add a subcontractor before the 2026-10-15 deadline. The map is the hook: it shows the work instead of describing it.
- 2026-10-10 to 10-15
If one says yes: sign a teaming agreement and get named in the proposal
Give them the map and a description of our data tools. They list Enhance as a subcontractor in the city's bidding system (PASSPort).
Why: The agreement locks in our role if they win. Being named in their proposal is what makes us part of the team.
- 2026-10-15 to early 2027
Wait for the award; finish the M/WBE certification
The M/WBE application (filed through the Port Authority, covering New York State and New York City too) is deleted 2026-12-01 if not submitted.
Why: The city asks bidders to use M/WBE subcontractors, so the certification makes Enhance easier to add, here and on the next bid.
- 2027-03-01 to 2028-02-29
If our team wins: deliver the four services below
Fixed fee per item, paid by the bidder.
Why: This is the paid work and the track record.
- After year one
Get a reference letter and count the experience
Experience Enhance earns as a subcontractor counts for Enhance later. The rule only stops a bidder from borrowing its subcontractor's experience.
Why: Those years count toward the qualifications Enhance lacks today, so Enhance could bid as the main contractor next time.
What Enhance offers the bidder, and why
1. Targeting map
A ranked map of which neighborhoods and host organizations qualify, built from public data: HUD's Ida disaster areas, low- and moderate-income tracts, NYC flood maps, the city's climate-justice priority areas, and the city's lists of business districts.
Why we provide it: The city asks for 'data-driven research' to pick the sites. It is quick for Jason to build (the same kind of map as the HUBZone check), and a free draft for the bidder's proposal costs us little while proving we can do the work.
2. Client tracking and reporting
Set up the client-tracking system (CRM), keep participant data in it, and produce the reports due every two weeks and the quarterly write-ups for the bidder to review and submit.
Why we provide it: The city will not supply the system, and the bidder only gets paid when its reports are accepted. Taking this on protects the bidder's cash flow, so it is the easiest thing to sell. It is squarely the automation work Jason does.
3. File conversion, plans and emergency information sheets
Paper-to-digital file conversion with text extraction and quality checks; first drafts of emergency procedures and strategic plans; emergency information sheets in the languages each neighborhood needs.
Why we provide it: File conversion is the first example the city lists, and Jason already has the document pipeline. The rest is drafting: AI writes the first version and people review it, so it is fast and cheap.
4. Workshop materials
Handouts, guides and worksheets for the bidder's trainers to use.
Why we provide it: The bidder keeps the teaching and the relationships, which is what the city is paying it for. We take the paperwork off its hands.
The bidder has what we lack: cohort experience, relationships with these organizations, trainers. We have what it lacks: fast data, reporting and drafting. We take only work we can do better and cheaper, so we help the bid instead of competing with the bidder.
Who else is offering: Four other firms asked the city to be listed as subcontractors before the list closed on 2026-09-28; Enhance is not on it, but a bidder can still name us directly. Two overlap with us: Keyla Consulting offers multilingual emergency information sheets, and Franglais Management offers research, data collection and reporting. None of them offers to set up and run the client-tracking system, automate the reports, build a targeting map or convert paper files. Those lead the pitch.
Likely bidders to approach
| Organization | Why likely | Fit | How to reach |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Coro New York Leadership Center | Runs the Neighborhood Leadership cohort with the city for business-district staff; city capacity-building contract $300,000 through 2028-06-30 (checked in Checkbook NYC). No disaster or reporting depth found, so it likely needs us. | High | David Rivera, Program Director, Neighborhood Leadership · David@coro.nyc · 212-248-2935 |
| 2. Community Resource Exchange (CRE) | The city's nonprofit-management partner for these groups; $120,000 city contract to 2027-06-30 (checked). No disaster or fellowship-payroll history found; would need data and document help. | High | Contact form at crenyc.org · Tiloma Jayasinghe, President and CEO |
| 3. Van Alen Institute | $100,000 city capacity-building grants in 2025 and 2026 (checked); ran a design fellowship with the city and post-Sandy recovery work. A design nonprofit, so reporting and file conversion are outside its core. | Medium-high | Andrew Brown, Director of Programs · abrown@vanalen.org · 212-924-7000 |
| 4. Support Center for Nonprofit Management | Held city capacity-building grants 2016-2024, then dropped off; may bid to get back in (inference). A training shop, so it would need data help. | Medium-high | 212-924-6744 · Keith Timko, Executive Director (per GuideStar) |
| 5. LISC NY | Co-launched the city's Neighborhood 360 program in 2016, already places paid fellows at community groups, did post-Sandy recovery. Large, with its own systems, so the opening is file conversion and site-level data. | High | NYCinfo@lisc.org · 212-455-9800 |
| 6. Urban Design Forum with ANHD | Has run cohorts for small business districts since 2023 with city backing. Less likely to bid. | Medium | Martha Snow, Urban Design Forum · martha@urbandesignforum.org |
Researched 2026-10-07 from the city's contract records (Checkbook NYC) and public pages; full notes in ccrp-likely-bidders_analysis_2026-10-07.md. Dropped: Hester Street (closed 2024), Baruch, Karp, BJH, HR&A (no evidence of city cohort work). ideas42, Pratt Center, Citizens Committee and AECOM are less likely primes.
Guardrails
| Rule | Why |
|---|---|
| Never call Enhance M/WBE-certified until it is. | A false claim on a city bid could disqualify the whole team. |
| Free work goes to the bidder, never to the city. | It is federal disaster money, and the rules on gifts to government apply. |
| The city owns what we make, not Jason's tools. | The contract gives the city ownership of work product and a free license to anything pre-existing used in it. We deliver documents and data, never the software, and the subcontract says so. |
| Never invent the bidder's sample report. | The proposal needs an example data report from one of the bidder's recent projects. We can format its real one; making one up would be a false statement. |
Money and fit
Likely Enhance share: about $20,000-$45,000 a year. The city's budget has $35,000 for implementation and $20,000 for plans, and the bidder does part of both; a data and reporting fee would come out of the bidder's own share.
A side lane. The main plan is still the federal VA work (home-loan servicing and acquisition support), which fits Bobby's mortgage background and pays more.
Who Enhance would have to hire to bid as the main contractor
No hire makes Enhance eligible for this bid: the experience has to be the company's own, not a new employee's from a past job, and the deadline is 8 days away. To bid as the main contractor on a later round, Enhance would need the team below plus $60,000-$120,000 to carry payroll for the first 2-4 months, because the city pays only after each deliverable is accepted. Only worth it if New York City community-business work becomes a lane we choose.
| Role | What it does | Hire or subcontract |
|---|---|---|
| Program director | Lead staff the proposal must name; designs the cohort and runs city check-ins. Ideally an ex-business-district director or ex-city staffer. | Hire |
| Fellowship manager | Recruits, hires, places and supervises the 6-10 Fellows. | Hire (the director could cover it in year one) |
| Resilience trainer | Teaches the 6-7 in-person disaster-preparedness workshops. | Subcontract |
| Data and reporting lead | Client tracking, reports, targeting map, document conversion. | Jason, already |
| 6-10 Fellows | Employees for the program year. The $360,000 line covers them plus recruiting and program costs, so about $30,000-$45,000 each. | Hire |
| Back office | Payroll, insurance, grant bookkeeping under federal rules, and a certified financial statement (the proposal asks for one). | Payroll service plus outside bookkeeper |
Decision and full facts: NYC-CCRP-80126P0020-DECISION_2026-10-07.md · Bobby's email: ccrp-sub-offer-bobby_draft_2026-10-07.txt
Where else Enhance can do this
Research run 2026-10-06 12:20 PM EST from public federal records (USAspending, SAM.gov, SBA certification search). Contract amounts are totals over five years. Every firm listed was re-checked as certified on the day of the research.
The best fit for Bobby: VA's home-loan program
Enhance's realistic role: Loan servicing and REO operations need licensed staff, title and property-management capacity and VA system access; EBC's realistic role is a subcontractor doing file review, title-package checks and correspondence drafting for whichever prime wins, not the prime itself.
The evidence
- Loan servicing and REO re-buy: Vendor Resource Management contract VA119A17C0062 (started 2017-07-01, coded real estate brokerage support (R402)), $200.6 million obligated, $374.4 million with options, ends 2027-06-30; VA's own requests for information for REO (notice VAREO, 2025-08-11) and for loan servicing (notice VALS, 2026-02-11) each say VA is checking whether a veteran-owned set-aside is possible; industry day 2026-08-12 (notice 36C10X26Q0218). Industry code on both RFIs: residential property managers (NAICS 531311).
- Loan Guaranty Service (LGY) mission support: SAG Corporation, order 36C10D24F0030 on GSA schedule 47QRAA20D008D, set aside for service-disabled veteran-owned firms, $18.2 million obligated, $33.7 million with options, period ends 2027-03-20 (options to 2029-03-20).
- Loan Guaranty 'loan appraisal services': Lynch Consultants, contract 36C10D25C0006, small-business set-aside, $3.7 million obligated, $18.7 million with options to 2030-09-22. It is coded as application development support (DA01), so it is probably the appraisal system, not appraisal review.
- Loan Guaranty regulatory drafting and impact analysis (GI4 LLC, $4.0 million, ended 2025-02-25), mortgage market data and loan subsidy model (Blake Willson Group): document work in Bobby's domain, bought from veteran-owned firms.
Specific openings beyond NCO 7
1. VA Loan Guaranty loan servicing and foreclosed-property (REO) management re-buy
Held by: Vendor Resource Management, Inc. (not found in SBA certification search (not a certified small business))
Value: $200.6 million obligated; $374.4 million with options
Ends: 2027-06-30
Buyer: VA Strategic Acquisition Center, Frederick MD (36C10X), for the Loan Guaranty Service
What Enhance would offer: Subcontract to a veteran-owned prime bidding either half (loan servicing or REO): title-package completeness review, servicer and borrower correspondence drafts, file QC against VA servicing rules, with Bobby as the mortgage-operations lead.
How solid: Strong for the opening (VA requests for information dated 2025-08-11 and 2026-02-11 test a veteran-owned set-aside; industry day 2026-08-12). Thin for EBC's fit: no veteran-owned prime is known yet to be bidding, and the core work needs licensed servicing and property-management capacity.
2. USDA Rural Development Servicing Office business operations support, including the National Default Management Services portfolio
Held by: Blake Willson Group LLC (SDVOSB active, certified through 2027-11-30; SAM active)
Value: $3.77 million (ends 2026-12-18) + $2.19 million (ends 2027-01-31), firm fixed price, coded market research and public opinion support (R422)
Ends: 2026-12-18 and 2027-01-31
Buyer: USDA Rural Development contract operations branch
What Enhance would offer: Mortgage-default and servicing-contract know-how plus AI-drafted portfolio, finance and contract-status reporting for the servicing office's default-management contracts.
How solid: Medium. The calls end in 2-4 months, but the parent agreement's own end date was not retrieved, so whether this is a new competition or another call to Blake Willson is unknown. Call Blake Willson first.
3. VA Loan Guaranty Service mission support
Held by: SAG Corporation (SDVOSB active, certified through 2029-09-01; SAM active)
Value: $18.2 million obligated; $33.7 million with options; veteran-owned set-aside; firm fixed price
Ends: 2027-03-20 (options to 2029-03-20)
Buyer: Veterans Benefits Administration contracting office (36C10D)
What Enhance would offer: Mortgage-domain analyst support and AI review of Loan Guaranty policy, circulars and lender documents inside SAG's existing order; pilot free to SAG on one deliverable.
How solid: Strong that the work exists and is veteran-owned; the options mean the real recompete may be 2029, so this is a subcontract play now, not a bid.
4. USDA Rural Development loan servicing support for the Servicing Office
Held by: Flatter, Inc (SDVOSB active, certified through 2027-11-18; SAM active)
Value: $11.3 million obligated; firm fixed price
Ends: 2027-09-29 (options to 2028-09-29)
Buyer: USDA Rural Development contract operations branch
What Enhance would offer: Servicing-file review, borrower-correspondence drafting and exceptions reporting by someone who has run mortgage servicing, with AI doing the first pass.
How solid: Medium. Award description is short; the set-aside type is not recorded on the call. A second agreement holder, 11th Hour Service LLC (UEI MKTEN9W6B3J5, SDVOSB active today per SBA), has a loan-servicing call ($11.7 million obligated, $44.1 million with options) running to 2031-03-10, so USDA splits this work between two veteran-owned firms; 11th Hour Service is a second prime to approach.
5. VA procurement decision-maker research and administration support
Held by: Metrics, LLC (SDVOSB active, certified through 2028-10-08; SAM active)
Value: $0.76 million obligated; $4.06 million with options; veteran-owned set-aside; firm fixed price; coded operations research and quantitative analysis (R405)
Ends: 2027-07-28 (options to 2031-07-28)
Buyer: VA Strategic Acquisition Center, Frederick MD (36C10X)
What Enhance would offer: AI-drafted research summaries and administrative packages for VA procurement decision-makers; the same skill set as EBC's rule-of-two package.
How solid: Thin. Small order with options to 2031; value is in the relationship with Metrics, which also appears on the acquisition-support list.
Five kinds of work, ranked
| # | Kind of work |
|---|---|
| 1 | Mortgage and housing-finance program support (VA Loan Guaranty Service, HUD/FHA and Ginnie Mae, USDA Rural Development housing) Bobby's own domain and the one lane where EBC is credible on day one. VA's Loan Guaranty Service buys from service-disabled veteran-owned firms; HUD and USDA mostly do not. The biggest dated opening in this report is here: VA is re-buying loan servicing and foreclosed-property (REO) management, now held by a $374 million contract that ends 2027-06-30, and its own notices ask whether veteran-owned firms can do it. |
| 2 | Policy, regulatory and program review/evaluation writing Highest AI fit: the product is written analysis. Veteran-owned firms get 62% of VA's dollars under these codes. Weak spot: 64% of those VA dollars went to firms that are no longer certified veteran-owned (Clear Vantage Point, Aptive), so the evidence for active veteran-owned primes here is thinner than the total suggests. |
| 3 | Program management support Biggest pool of active veteran-owned primes at VA (149 firms, $1.03 billion, 91% fixed-price at VA). The work is mostly staff hours, so AI covers only part of it, but there are many orders of $1 million to $5 million (162 at VA). |
| 4 | Accounting, audit and financial management support A real, document-heavy lane ($75.7 million to veteran-owned firms at VA; $796 million government-wide), but EBC would need a CPA partner and approved access to agency finance systems. Only 21 veteran-owned firms won VA work here. |
| 5 | Data collection and analytical studies Good AI fit and active veteran-owned primes (77% of VA dollars), but small: $33.6 million at VA over five years across 73 awards. |
Ten firms to approach about subcontracting
All certified service-disabled veteran-owned firms today. "VA work" is their five-year VA total in these kinds of work.
| Firm | State | VA work | Certified until | Next contract ends | Why them, and what Enhance offers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stafford Consulting Company, Inc.GMQFM999K2E5 | Virginia | $89.1M | 2027-05-30 | 2027-03-31 | VA's largest acquisition-support firm: 56 mid-size VA orders, all fixed-price, 7 orders on the Network Contracting Office 20 (NCO 20) agreement ending 2027-09-22. Offer: AI-drafted market research, sources-sought analysis and contract-file packages that let them staff more orders with the same people; free pilot on one of their orders. |
| Pathfinder Consultants, LLCNE7FN362JCH1 | Virginia | $48.7M | 2029-08-08 | 2026-12-31 | Second-largest VA acquisition-support firm: 43 mid-size VA orders, all fixed-price; four VA eastern regional procurement office (RPO East) orders end 2027-09-20 and an NCO 23 order ends 2026-12-31. Offer: same package as for Stafford, pitched as margin on fixed-price orders. |
| SAG CorporationWEPCNMBW2RW4 | Virginia | $24.8M | 2029-09-01 | 2027-03-20 | Holds VA Loan Guaranty Service mission support ($18.2 million, set aside for veteran-owned firms; current period ends 2027-03-20, options to 2029-03-20) and VA collections-forecast modeling (ends 2027-05-31). Offer: Bobby's 18 years of mortgage operations plus AI loan-file and policy-document review inside their Loan Guaranty work. |
| Blake Willson Group LLCXXF1YX4AQXS5 | Virginia | $5.8M | 2027-11-30 | 2027-09-28 | The most housing-finance-focused veteran-owned firm found: VA Loan Guaranty mortgage-market data and loan-subsidy model, Ginnie Mae financial improvement ($4.6 million, ends 2027-07-20), USDA Rural Development servicing-office support. Offer: mortgage-domain analyst capacity and AI document review for their HUD, Ginnie Mae and VA housing work. Note: SBA certification runs only to 2027-11-30. |
| Trilogy Federal, LLCQY6ZENEB34D9 | Virginia | $199.3M | 2028-05-10 | 2027-02-28 | Largest active veteran-owned firm in these lanes at VA ($199 million, 50 mid-size orders), holds VA's Veterans Health Administration Integrated Healthcare Transformation contract vehicle (VHA IHT); one order ends 2027-02-28. Only 65% fixed-price. Offer: AI-produced reports and analysis on their fixed-price orders, where time saved becomes margin. |
| Sierra7, Inc.NP4TUKF8QCM5 | Virginia | $47.2M | 2028-06-06 | 2027-06-13 | 26 mid-size VA orders, fixed-price, including privacy-impact assessment writing (ends 2027-06-13), which is document work. Offer: AI first drafts of privacy and compliance documents. |
| Metrics, LLCF541XAYTKKN5 | Virginia | $31.9M | 2028-10-08 | 2026-12-20 | 24 mid-size VA orders, fixed-price; procurement subject-matter-expert order ends 2026-12-20. Already on the acquisition-support list. Offer: acquisition-document drafting. |
| Cathexis, LLCH893H8FL41D3 | Virginia | $126.7M | 2028-04-24 | 2026-12-31 | $127 million VA; a VA financial-audit order labeled 'MDE' (unknown code in the award text; $17.3 million, ends 2027-07-31) plus policy work. Offer: AI audit-workpaper and policy-document drafting, with their CPAs signing. |
| Dynamic Integrated Services, LLCLULHX8RK9JC8 | Florida | $24.3M | 2029-10-08 | 2027-08-24 | Ran VA Loan Guaranty staffing support (ended 2025-02-25) and holds VBA strategic communication and change management ($12.7 million, ends 2027-09-29). Florida, closest of the Loan Guaranty firms to the NCO 7 region. Offer: mortgage-domain support for a Loan Guaranty re-bid and AI drafting for VBA communications. |
| Flatter, IncJJXNBUX9HE33 | Virginia | $0K | 2027-11-18 | 2027-09-29 | Holds USDA Rural Development loan servicing support ($11.3 million, ends 2027-09-29, options to 2028-09-29). No VA work in these lanes. Offer: servicing-file review and borrower-correspondence drafting by someone who has run mortgage servicing. |
VA contracts ending in the next 15 months
The largest VA contracts in these kinds of work that end by 2027-12-31 and are held by a certified veteran-owned firm, in date order. When one ends, the firm holding it decides whether to bring in subcontractors for the next round.
| Ends | Work and office | Held by | Value | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-10-30 | The Contractor Shall Furnish All Personnel To Provide Services Necessary To ExpaCOMMODITIES & SERVICES ACQUISITION SERVICE (36C791) | Four Points Technology, L.l.c. | $30.6M | record |
| 2027-01-08 | Task Order For Vba, Edu Compliance Survey Services | 101VETERANS BENEFITS ADMIN (36C10D) | Saint George Consulting Inc. | $32.2M | record |
| 2027-03-20 | Lgy Mission Support ServicesVETERANS BENEFITS ADMIN (36C10D) | SAG Corporation | $33.7M | record |
| 2027-04-24 | Benefits Appeals And Memorial Program Management Office And Technical ManagementTECHNOLOGY ACQUISITION CENTER NJ (36C10B) | Microhealth LLC | $154.9M | record |
| 2027-07-29 | Benefits Data Quality ServicesVETERANS BENEFITS ADMIN (36C10D) | Techwerks LLC | $18.0M | record |
| 2027-07-31 | Financial Audit For MdeSAC FREDERICK (36C10X) | Cathexis, LLC | $33.9M | record |
| 2027-08-06 | Department Of Veterans Affairs (va) Veterans Health Administration (vha) RequireSAC FREDERICK (36C10X) | Gritter - Francona, Inc | $23.3M | record |
| 2027-09-08 | Strategic Investment Management Support ServicesSAC FREDERICK (36C10X) | Gritter - Francona, Inc | $57.1M | record |
| 2027-09-25 | Vha Iht Idiq Contract- Coffee Task Order AwardSAC FREDERICK (36C10X) | Trilogy Federal, LLC | $142.3M | record |
| 2027-09-29 | Strategic Communication & Change Management ServicesVETERANS BENEFITS ADMIN (36C10D) | Dynamic Integrated Services, LLC | $28.2M | record |
| 2027-09-29 | Vba Obi Military Records Research Center Support Services Purchase.VETERANS BENEFITS ADMIN (36C10D) | Lefant LLC | $18.9M | record |
| 2027-12-09 | Business Architecture Health Architecture ModernizationRPO CENTRAL (36C24C) | Phronesis Global Training Solutions LLC | $29.5M | record |
What Enhance would offer
The pitch to a prime is the same everywhere: EBC produces a first draft with AI, a person checks it, and the prime delivers the same product with fewer labor hours. On a fixed-price order the saved hours are the prime's margin. The pilot is free or cheap to the prime, never to the agency (31 U.S.C. 1342 bars accepting free services).
- Mortgage and housing finance (VA Loan Guaranty, USDA Rural Development, HUD). Loan-file and closed-loan-package review against VA, FHA or USDA guides; servicing-file QC; title-package completeness checks for foreclosed (REO) properties; draft borrower and servicer correspondence; mortgage-market and loan-subsidy analysis from public data. Bobby signs off as the mortgage-operations expert. Pilot: review a sample of de-identified files the prime supplies and return an exceptions report.
- Policy, regulatory and program review writing. Draft regulatory text and impact analyses from the Federal Register and CFR; comment summaries; program reviews and evaluation reports from client documents; citation-checked policy memos. Pilot: one rule-change impact summary for a VA program the prime supports.
- Program management support. Status reports, briefing decks, meeting minutes, schedules and standard operating procedures drafted from the prime's notes and trackers. Pilot: one month of reporting for one order, produced alongside the prime's staff for comparison.
- Financial and audit support. Audit-readiness narratives, internal-control test write-ups, reconciliation summaries and finding letters, drafted for the prime's CPAs to review and sign. Pilot: write-ups for one control area from workpapers the prime provides.
- Data collection and analytical studies. Survey and data analysis, data-quality reports and statistical summaries from client-provided datasets. Pilot: one analysis on a dataset the prime can share.
- Contract and acquisition support (already packaged). Market research and rule-of-two packages like the NCO 7 sample, sources-sought analysis, draft statements of work and contract-file checklists from public data.
Where the work runs inside agency systems (VA's eCMS contract-file system, VBMS claims system, VALERI loan system, financial systems), the AI tools must be ones the agency has approved; until then EBC works only on documents the prime may share outside those systems.
What surprised us
- Outside VA, mortgage-program work rarely goes to veteran-owned firms. In the keyword sample, 4 of 164 HUD housing-program awards and 8 of 67 USDA housing awards were to veteran-owned firms; HUD buys mortgage operations through full and open competition, small-business set-asides and 8(a). Veteran-owned status is a door at VA, not at HUD.
- Many of the biggest veteran-owned primes at VA are no longer certified today (Aptive HTG, Titan Alpha, Clear Vantage Point I and II, Signature Choice, TISTA, Tribility, Blue Phoenix). That share of VA dollars is 64% in policy work and 61% in other professional support. Their contracts recompete without them as veteran-owned bidders, which opens room for the active firms in this list.
- New York has almost no veteran-owned primes in these lanes: 19 firms and $10.3 million government-wide, $0.2 million at VA. New Jersey: 14 firms, $33.9 million. The primes are in Northern Virginia and Maryland. Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina have 155 firms between them but only $78 million at VA, most of it two South Carolina firms.
- Most VA orders in these lanes are task orders under VA or GSA multiple-award contract vehicles (VA's VHA Integrated Healthcare Transformation vehicle (IHT); GSA's Multiple Award Schedule and OASIS professional-services vehicles). When an order ends, only vehicle holders can bid on the next one. That favors subcontracting first, as already decided.
- 6 of the 15 primes have SBA certifications that come up for renewal by 2028-03-31: Lynch Consultants, LLC 2027-02-05; Blue Water Thinking, LLC 2027-02-28; Stafford Consulting Company, Inc. 2027-05-30; Jamison Professional Services Inc. 2027-07-25; Flatter, Inc 2027-11-18; Blake Willson Group LLC 2027-11-30. Renewal is routine, but a lapse would end their eligibility for veteran-owned set-asides. Trevor L Newman (New Jersey, on the acquisition-support list) is due 2026-11-13. Ask before teaming.
- Of the five codes suggested on 2026-10-06, all resolved. The most useful find is outside VA: Blake Willson Group's USDA Rural Development servicing-office calls, coded market research (R422) but actually supporting the default-management portfolio, end 2026-12-18 and 2027-01-31. Mathematical and statistical studies (B524) is effectively empty for veteran-owned firms.
The pitch page
What primes see: ebc-rule-of-two.pages.dev, a rule-of-two sample for VA's NCO 7 acquisition-support job.