Unisys keeps fighting for TSA contract

Unisys Corp. has filed another protest after the Transportation Security Agency awarded its $500 million infrastructure contract to Computer Sciences Corp. for a second time.

TSA re-evaluated bids for the contract after Unisys and General Dynamics Corp. filed protests following an award to CSC in September. The Government Accountability Office told TSA to look again at pricing and technical merits. On May 19, TSA again picked CSC for the five-year, $489 million contract.

Unisys filed two protests May 27, according to GAO’s Web site. Decisions on the protests are due by Sept. 7. GAO has issued a stop-work order, which means CSC cannot work on the contract until the protest is resolved.

A company spokesman said Unisys believes the TSA’s evaluation process did not comply with the request for proposals or with the guidelines GAO issued in upholding Unisys’ protest earlier this year.

Officials with CSC were not available for comment. 

As the incumbent contractor, Unisys will continue to manage TSA’s IT infrastructure. The company won the original contract in 2002 shortly after the agency was created. Since that time, the contract has been worth about $2 billion to Unisys.

The follow-on contract, called the IT Infrastructure Program, has a lower price tag because it includes the contractor's ownership of any hardware.