By SBA rules, a minimum of 23% of federal contracting dollars must go to small businesses rather than large enterprises, with additional minimum percentages for categories such as women-owned, service-disabled veteran-owned, disadvantaged (including 8(a)), and HUBZone businesses. Agencies at every level carry similar goals.
These goals show up in two ways:
Set-aside contracts are published solicitations that only businesses in the designated category may bid on, which dramatically reduces competition for qualifying vendors.
Sole-source awards happen when an agency that has not met its category goals searches the SBA's small business database directly and reaches out to a qualified vendor without running a public competition. This is common near the end of the fiscal year.
This is why being registered and findable in the government's vendor databases matters so much: sole-source opportunities go to businesses that officers can actually find, with complete profiles that show they can deliver.