Effective October 21, 2016, DoD, GSA, and NASA issued a final rule to amend the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) and implement sections of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 and regulatory changes made by the Small Business Administration (SBA), which provide for a Governmentwide policy on consolidation and bundling.
The most significant change as a result of the final rule is to FAR Part 7.107, which includes the additional requirements for acquisition plans involving consolidation, bundling, or substantial bundling.
Bundling means a subset of consolidation that combines two or more requirements for supplies or services, previously provided or performed under separate smaller contracts, into a solicitation for a single contract, a multiple-award contract, or a task or delivery order that is likely to be unsuitable for award to a small business concern due to–
(1) The diversity, size, or specialized nature of the elements of performance;
(2) The aggregate dollar value of the anticipated award;
(3) The geographical dispersion of the contract performance sites; or
(4) Any combination of the above factors.
NOTE: This definition does not apply to a contract that will be awarded and performed entirely outside of the United States.
Consolidation means a solicitation for a single contract, a multiple-award contract, a task order, or a delivery order to satisfy–
(1) Two or more requirements for supplies or services that have been provided to or performed for the Federal agency under two or more separate contracts, each of which was lower in cost than the total cost of the contract for which offers are solicited; or
(2) Requirements of the Federal agency for construction projects to be performed at two or more discrete sites.
Substantial bundling is any bundling that results in a contract task or delivery order with an estimated value of–
(1) $8 million or more for the Department of Defense;
(2) $6 million or more for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the General Services Administration, and the Department of Energy; or
(3) $2.5 million or more for all other agencies.
These thresholds apply to the cumulative estimated dollar value (including options) of multiple-award contracts; task orders or delivery orders issued against a GSA Schedule contract; or task orders or delivery orders issued against a task-order or delivery-order contract awarded by another agency.
Any CO who is planning on using bundling or consolidation is going to be required to provide a massive amount of justification to very high levels of their agencies to get approval. It is getting much harder for COs to justify that any requirement cannot be fulfilled by a small business.
Within DOD, bundling and consolidation are not encouraged because of all the hoops that the CO has to jump through. Even with the best documented reasons, these strategies are shot down.
So be aware that changes have been made to this section of the FAR and you can read the entire final rule shown in the link in the first paragraph.