Protest holds up $1.4B Justice IT contract

The Justice Department’s $1.4 billion IT Support Services 5 contract has been hit with a bid protest by an unhappy service-disabled, veteran-owned company that wasn’t picked as a winner.

22^nd Century Technologies Inc. made it through phase one of the competition but didn’t receive an award after phase two of the procurement. The company is challenging the evaluation process DOJ used to award the contract.

The multiple-award contract will have winners in the unrestricted category as well as various small business categories. In April, DOJ announced its intent to give awards to nine service-disabled, veteran-owned businesses but 22nd Century was not one of those.

IT Support Services is one of the longer running IDIQ contracts in the market since the first award in 1996. The contract offers a broad base of services such as design and development, help desk support, IT operations, security, program management and IT planning. It also can support staffing requirements.

DOJ says it component agencies often have small IT staff so the contract is used to supplement and support those staffs.

22nd Century filed its protest May 14 and a decision is expected Aug. 22.

Other portions of the contract are also expected to be awarded later this summer.