Indiana and Michigan issue Stay Home Executive Orders with Significant Business Implications

Governors Holcomb of Indiana and Whitmer of Michigan both issued Executive Orders on Monday, March 23, 2020 restricting personal and business activities and travel in response to the COVID-19 virus.

· Holcomb’s Executive Order 20-08 Directive for Hoosiers to Stay at Home is in effect from 11:59 PM, March 24, 2020 through 11:59 PM April 6, 2020.

· Whitmer’s Executive Order 2020-21 (COVID-19) is in effect from 12:01 AM, March 23, 2020 through 11:59 PM, April 13, 2020.   

Both Orders prohibit individuals “living in the state” from leaving their residence except for permitted activities and travel. The Orders also require all non-exempt businesses or operations to cease operating except for home-based work and certain minimum basic operations required to protect the business assets and facilities or to facilitate home-based work.  Even if a business is permitted to continue on premises operations, it must adopt policies to protect its workers and customers, including eliminating in-person meetings where possible, enforcing social distancing, and implementing frequent cleaning and disinfecting practices.

There are several important distinctions between the way that the Indiana and Michigan Orders effect businesses:

  • Indiana’s Order is set to expire one week prior to Michigan’s; 

  • Indiana utilizes a business-focused exemption approach that allows businesses defined as “Essential Businesses and Operations” to continue on premises operations, while encouraging those businesses to allow as many employees as possible to work from home; 

  • In contrast, Michigan takes an employee-focused exemption approach in which only the portion of a business’s workforce defined as “critical infrastructure workers” may participate in on premises operations, while all other workers must cease working unless they can work from home.  Moreover, the Michigan Order requires businesses to proactively determine which, if any of their workers are critical infrastructure workers and to inform those workers of the designation;

  • Both Orders exempt business operations included in the sixteen Critical Infrastructure Sectors identified by the Federal Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) of the Department of Homeland Security.  The Sectors include:

    Chemical Sector ·  Commercial Facilities Sector · Communications Sector · Critical Manufacturing Sector · Dams Sector · Defense Industrial Base Sector · Emergency Services Sector · Energy Sector · Financial Services Sector · Food and Agriculture Sector · Government Facilities Sector · Healthcare and Public Health Sector · Information Technology Sector · Nuclear Reactors, Materials, and Waste Sector · Transportation Systems Sector · Water and Wastewater Systems Sector.

  • Indiana’s Order expands the exemption by specifically including a broad range of businesses and operations in the definition of Essential Businesses and Operations.  Michigan’s list of additional exempt business activities is brief, but the Order allows critical infrastructure businesses to designate suppliers, distribution centers and service providers as necessary to enable, support of facilitate the work of their critical infrastructure workers. A designated business must then designate its own critical infrastructure workers and may designate yet additional suppliers, distribution centers and service providers as necessary to enable, support of facilitate the work of the designated business’s critical infrastructure workers.

  • A Michigan business’s designation of workers, suppliers, distribution centers and service providers must be in writing and the business is required to notify the designated individual or business of the designation (although designations may be made orally until 11:59 PM March 31, 2020). Indiana’s exemption is self-operating and does not mandate any designation or notice requirement. Nevertheless, Indiana businesses should consider making the designations, particularly where their workforce or supplier base includes Michigan residents or businesses.

The differences in the Orders may create challenges for those businesses operating in one state, but having employees in living in the other state (or in Illinois, Kentucky or Ohio, all of which are subject to Stay Home executive orders). The Michigan Order places affirmative designation burdens on businesses seeking to take advantage of the critical worker and supplier exemptions and it limits the portion of the workforce and operations that may continue. There is little clarity in either Order as to how the business restrictions will be enforced or what penalties may be levied in the event of an intentional or inadvertent breach (although a subsequent Executive Order by Holcomb addresses violations by restaurants and bars).

Additionally, the interplay of the Stay Home Orders with the new Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA), which was enacted into law on March 18, 2020 and becomes effective on April 2, 2020, is uncertain at best and could have devastating implications for many small businesses.  Hopefully, the Department of Labor and the Administration will help clarify the application of the FFCRA in the coming weeks.

This is a high level summary only, and does not constitute legal advice.  Please consult our firm or other qualified legal counsel if you need specific legal advice or recommendations.

Goodbye DUNS, Hello SAMMI!

After decades of granting Dun & Bradstreet a monopoly over the unique entity identification number used in the Contractor Registration (CCR) and System for Award Management (www.SAM.gov), the Federal Government is transitioning away from the Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) to a new Government owned System for Award Management Managed Identifier, or SAMMI number. Stay tuned for further details on the changes coming to SAM.gov and contractor facing processes as a result.

NSF Pilots Abbreviated Pitch Requirement with Latest SBIR|STTR Releases

On March 5, 2019, the National Science Foundation (NSF) released a new set of Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Tech Transfer (STTR) I topics. Effective with Program Solicitations SBIR 19-554 and STTR 19-555, Phase I proposers may not submit a full proposal unless they are invited to do so after submitting a three-page "Project Pitch" that outlines the project objectives, technical innovation and associated technical risks. NSF states that it is implementing the new pitch process to provide proposers with rapid feedback before they draft a full proposal. This “fail-fast” process will enable the NSF to quickly weed out proposed projects that are not aligned with NSF goals. In the end, the reduced effort required to develop an abbreviated pitch may encourage more proposers to submit projects - potentially increasing the number of potential projects submitted to NSF, while simultaneously saving proposers and NSF review panels the time they would otherwise have spent preparing/reviewing/debating/debriefing full proposals that were doomed from the start.

As a part of the Project Pitch pilot process, the NSF SBIR/STTR Phase I program is ditching specific submission and review deadlines in favor of full proposal submission windows. Proposers may submit Project Pitches at any time via an online form. NSF will then invite proposers to submit full proposals within the windows defined in the Solictations.

Check out the topics and programs details in Program Solicitations SBIR 19-554 and STTR 19-555. Both solicitations provide for submission windows of March 04, 2019 - June 13, 2019 and June 14, 2019 - December 31, 2019.

SAM.gov Registration Delays...

SAM.gov Registration Delays...

Due to fraudulent activity in which company registrations in the System for Award Management  (www.SAM.gov) were created or modified without company consent, GSA has implemented a new policy that will delay new entity registration in www.SAM.gov.  To complete registration in SAM, companies are now required to submit an original, signed notarized letter identifying the authorized Entity Administrator for the entity associated with the Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number before the registration will be activated. 

Indiana Innovation Institute announces $2.3M trusted microelectronics collaboration

Indiana Innovation Institute announces $2.3M trusted microelectronics collaboration

The Indiana Innovation Institute (IN3) recently announced the launch of a $2.3M trusted microelectronics collaboration with personnel from Crane Naval Surface Warfare Center, the University of Notre Dame, Indiana University and Purdue University.  The research will focus on designing microelectronics to be immune to hardware and software-based attacks and be resistant to counterfeiting.

Indiana to streamline early-stage capital program support for Hoosier businesses

Via a news release issued this morning, Elevate Ventures and the IEDC announced that the state’s Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer (SBIR/STTR) program will now be administered fully by Elevate Ventures.

The release highlights our region's SBIR/STTR Accelerator:

Innov8IN’s SBIR/STTR Accelerator (South Bend, Ind.)

Dave Temeles is familiar with the SBIR/STTR landscape and has seen how the program can be a powerful gateway for companies interested in securing major government contracts.

When he and his family moved from Washington, D.C., to South Bend in 2016, he looked at how well Indiana, and in particular the North Central region, was winning federally funded business deals compared to neighboring states. He saw a stark imbalance and a great opportunity.

How deep is the disparity? In 2016, Indiana companies did $3.9 billion worth of business in federal contracts. Compare that to $5.2 billion in Michigan, $5.4 billion in Ohio, $8.7 billion in Illinois and $6.6 billion in Kentucky.

Through support from the law firm where he works, Ladue Curran Kuehn, Temeles is tackling the challenge through the new development of Innova8IN, a growing SBIR/STTR accelerator focused on helping companies get into federally funded research and the SBIR/STTR program.

Phase 3 of the SBIR/STTR program provides a real opportunity to get into federal contracting, but is often misunderstood. If a company has received SBIR/STTR funding, the federal government has the ability to use a Phase 3 contracting vehicle to buy its product or service without the constraints of competition, money or time limitations. These barriers are crossed through the completion of Phases 1 and 2.

LCK is pleased to play a role in the expansion of SBIR/STTR R&D funding in the region.  The SBIR|STTR Accelerator is accepting applications for our next cohort, so please contact us if you are interested participating!

Read the full news release here about this significant news. 

Small biz wins $950M Cloud Services contract with DOD

The U.S. Department of Defense recently awarded a $950M contract to REAN Cloud, a small business cloud services Amazon Web Services provider.  The DoD awarded the contract through the OTA program.  If you attended one of our seminars last fall, you're already aware that OTA (Other Transaction Authority) acquisitions are rapidly gaining favor within the current Administration as they allow the Federal Government to shorten the acquisition cycle to make large purchases - particularly in the tech arena.  The Government is spending billions of dollars moving legacy software systems into the cloud, so significant dollars are at stake.  Let us know if you want to learn more about OTAs or how to break into the federal marketplace.

https://www.reancloud.com/news/rean-cloud-awarded-cloud-contract-department-defense-worth-950-million/