Good News for Woman-Owned Small Businesses

December 2006

A new preference program has been proposed to Congress that could add $10 billion in federal contracts for women-owned small businesses. The new program will likely be named the 8(m) program – the (m) reflects the section number of the authorizing legislation. The program will allow contracting officers to make sole source awards to certified woman-owned small businesses with the same limitations as the other small business preference programs.

The new 8(m) program, which is expected to be implemented by the end of 2006, will only apply to two specific industry groups. These groups have yet to be determined since the Small Business Administration (SBA) is in the process of completing a study to determine which woman-owned small businesses are "underrepresented" and "substantially underrepresented" in federal procurement arenas.

The 8(m) program certification is expected to be similar to the 8(a) certification program in that the requirements of the two programs will mirror each other. With this in mind, it is beneficial for woman-owned companies to examine the 8(a) program application (available at the SBA's web site https://sba8a.symplicity.com/applicants/guide ) in anticipation of this new requirement by the federal government.