All posts by SEO Team

Understanding the Federal 8(a) Program

Small businesses are the economic engine of the U.S. economy, and fostering their growth is essential for sustained economic vitality and social prosperity. The Federal 8(a) Business Development Program plays a vital role in empowering disadvantaged entrepreneurs. It has its roots in the Small Business Act of 1953 and, over the decades, has become crucial in providing a level playing field for small businesses owned by individuals who have historically faced challenges competing in the federal procurement marketplace.  Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 75 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. How the 8(a) Program Works  Under the 8(a) program, the SBA enters into contracts with other federal entities in the role of prime contractor. SBA then awards subcontracts either competitively or on a sole-source basis to certified 8(a) program participants that will execute the work.  Eligibility Criteria  To participate in the 8(a) Program, businesses must meet the criteria established by the SBA:  The business must qualify as a small business by SBA standards, which are based on industry-specific criteria such as...

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Davis-Bacon Updates and Implications for Contractors

Historical Perspective Keeping on the right side of the many regulations governing the wages paid to people working on federally funded construction projects can be challenging. And it’s been challenging since the Davis-Bacon Act, or DBA, was passed in 1931. Nearly a century later, there are approximately 60 legislative acts that collectively are referred to as the Davis-Bacon-Related Acts, or DBRA. The DBA has become an umbrella under which all of the DBRA fall. The DBA requires “payment of locally prevailing wages and fringe benefits to laborers and mechanics” working on construction “contracts that exceed the amount of $2,000 to which the U.S. or District of Columbia is a party.” That turned out to be a more complicated matter than the DBA’s authors anticipated, resulting in the plethora of DBRA that have further explained, elaborated upon, and extended the original DBA. Legislators refined and expanded the meaning of “prevailing wages,” devised rules for wage determinations and job classifications, and expanded DBA coverage to include projects funded by a wider range of federal sources, such as grants, loans, loan guarantees, and other sources of federal assistance. While DBA itself applies to work done on federal government buildings, District of Columbia,...

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8 Best Ways to Minimize Profit Fade in Construction

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. What Is Profit Fade? No contractor wants to discover that they aren’t going to make as much profit on a project as initially estimated. Unfortunately, it’s not uncommon to find that the profit margin for a given construction project shrinks or even disappears by the time work is completed. It’s even more unfortunate that sometimes, that “profit fade” doesn’t become apparent until it’s too late to do much about it.  Project owners and surety bond providers typically require periodic financial reports showing the percentage of project completion and the profit recognized as of each reporting date. In a perfect world, those percentages match—when 50% of a project has been completed, 50% of the total estimated profit has been recognized, and so on. At the end of the project, when 100% of the work has been completed, and 100% of the estimated profit has been recognized. It’s when 100% of the profit has been recognized before 100% of the work...

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New Construction Innovation from CES

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. Technology Drives Progress Every January, people from all over the world with interest in technology flock to Nevada for the annual CES trade show sponsored by the Consumer Technology Association. CES features every sector’s latest and greatest technological developments, including construction. In 2023, more than 115,000 people, over 40,000 of them from other countries, attended. Some of the innovations highlighted at CES are already available commercially, while others are still in the conceptual or prototype stage. In either case, contractors can find inspiration and new options for improvement in every phase of the construction process, from design and engineering to field operations. Long-term growth comes from understanding that what seems futuristic today very quickly can become tomorrow’s best practices. The theme of CES in 2023, which featured over 3200 exhibitors, including 1000 startups, focused on Human Security for All (HS4A). The intent was to show how technology could address humanity’s greatest challenges. According to Gary Shapiro, CTA’s president, and CEO,...

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How Big Data Improves Construction

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. What Is Big Data? Oracle defines “big data” as larger, more complex data sets that are so voluminous that traditional data processing software can’t manage them. Big data provides the basis for addressing business problems previously too difficult to tackle.  The “three V’s” help explain the challenges inherent in working with big data. Volume refers to the enormous amount of data—for example, in databases containing BIM and 3-D modeling files and from continuous collection of data from sensor-equipped equipment and PPE. Some organizations are dealing with terabytes of data, while for others, it may be hundreds of petabytes.  Velocity describes the speed at which data are created and collected and perhaps acted upon, potentially in real-time.  Variety is all about the different kinds of data points involved—traditionally structured data in a relational database and, increasingly, new unstructured and semi-structured data that require additional processing to derive meaningful insights. Since these three V’s were delineated, three more V’s have emerged:...

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Fintech Trends for Construction Finance in 2023

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. What Is Fintech? Fintech (short for financial technology) is defined as technology that seeks to improve and automate the delivery and use of financial services. It has expanded from its origins in automating the “back office” operations of banks and other large financial institutions. It is now used by companies in many sectors to manage their financial operations and processes. In recent years Fintech has been gaining traction in the construction sector. Key Financial Services for Construction There are three key financial services in construction in which value is estimated and exchanged—payments, lending, and insurance. All three involve significant pain points for construction contractors and other stakeholders. Contractors, suppliers, workers, project owners, investors, and lenders all want the same outcome: on-time completion. But at the same time, certain conflicts of interest that are baked into the process can prevent them from achieving that shared goal.  Conflicts of Interest For example, contractors want to be paid based on tasks completed...

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Contech Trends in 2023

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. Technology Drives Progress In every field of human endeavor, technology drives progress. It’s hard to think of any new development in construction technology that has failed to increase efficiency, productivity, and/or quality. It may, however, take some time for construction businesses to embrace and adopt new technology. The benefits of doing so must be clear enough for companies to make the necessary investment in new technology and reap the rewards. And sometimes, it takes a major challenge for the benefits of investing in construction technology to become readily apparent. Challenges Driving Technology Adoption in Construction For many construction firms, the global Covid-19 pandemic was probably the greatest such challenge to arise in recent years. The shortage of skilled construction workers has been and remains a major challenge. Other key challenges, some directly linked to the pandemic, include: the need to compete against construction companies with a high rate of technology adoption,  supply chain disruptions and the resulting materials shortages...

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Form Energy Building Battery Plant in West Virginia

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. The Form Energy Battery Plant Project Construction is scheduled to begin in 2023 on Massachusetts-based Form Energy’s new iron-air battery plant in Weirton, West Virginia, with battery production slated to begin in 2024. Weirton, a former steel town, was chosen as the plant’s location largely due to the financial incentive package offered by the state of West Virginia.  The $75 million allocated by the West Virginia Economic Development Authority to purchase the land, the site of a former steel plant, gave the state a major advantage against 15 other states competing for the project and 750 promised new manufacturing jobs. An additional $215 million in state and federal funds brings the total financial incentive package to $290 million. Advantages of Iron-air Batteries Form Energy describes iron-air batteries as longer-lasting, able to store electricity for up to 100 hours. Iron-air batteries also are reported as cheaper and more sustainably scalable than lithium-ion batteries. These qualities are essential to making renewable...

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Bitcoin Money Transmitter vs. Money Transmitter: What’s the Difference?

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your surety bond needs. What Is a Money Transmitter? The U.S. government has identified the following as money services businesses: Currency dealer or exchanger Check casher Issuer of traveler’s checks, money orders, or stored value Seller or redeemer of traveler’s checks, money orders, or stored value Money transmitter For every entity on this list other than money transmitters, there is an activity threshold of $1,000 per day in one or more transactions to be considered a money services business. There is no activity threshold for money transmitters. Anyone engaging as a business in transferring funds in any amount as an intermediary between two parties is a money transmitter. Money transmitters must be registered with the Department of Treasury and licensed in every state in which they operate. The question is whether transferring Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies is considered to be transmitting “money” and therefore subject to regulation as a money transmitter. How Is Cryptocurrency Money Transmission Defined? Initially, cryptocurrency existed in a gray...

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