More protest troubles for $900M Special Operations contract
By
Nick Wakeman
A second round of awards has been met with a second round of bid protests as the U.S. Special Operations Command struggles to get its $900 million support contract off the ground.
The U.S. Special Operations Command $900 million contract for mission support is headed into protest-troubled waters again.
The contract was first awarded in July 2015 and was quickly hit with several protests. The command pulled the award back to take a corrective action and earlier this month, six more companies were added to the four that originally won the contract.
Now, Alion Science and Technology has filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office because it didn’t win a contract.
More protests could be coming, as 17 companies submitted bids on the contract.
The winners in round one were:
- Booz Allen Hamilton
- CACI International
- Raytheon Blackbird Technologies
- MacAulay-Brown
On June 5, the command added:
- ACADEMI Training Center
- AECOM
- ARMA Global Corp. (part of General Dynamics)
- Fulcrum IT Services
- Jacobs Technology
- Raytheon Technical Services
ACADEMI, Fulcrum IT Services and Jacobs all had filed protests with GAO when they weren’t picked originally.
The Special Operations Command wants to use the contract for a variety of engineering, program management and professional services.
For example, in a sample task order that is part of the solicitation, the command wants support for security analysis at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Fla., to help the Identity Operations Branch process and distribute intelligence. A second part of the task is for digital media technicians and computer forensics analysts at Fort Bragg, N.C. A third objective of the task order is to support tactical and operational analysis to various locations in Afghanistan, Africa and MacDill.
The contract runs through 2020.
Alion filed its protest June 13. A decision is expected by Sept. 21.