SAIC renews battle with Leidos over $2.5B NASA IT contract
By
Nick Wakeman
NASA upheld its award to Leidos of a $2.5 billion IT services contract, so Science Applications International Corp. is back with another protest over the evaluation.
It has taken a couple months, but Science Applications International Corp. is back at the Government Accountability Office with a new protest filed Monday over a $2.5 billion NASA IT product and services contract that went to Leidos.
The companies are competing for the 10-year Advanced Enterprise Global Information Technology Solutions contract that covers networks, cybersecurity, collaboration tools, emergency and early warning systems, telephony, cabling and radio systems for the NASA enterprise.
SAIC is the incumbent through a takeaway win in 2011 from the Lockheed Martin IS&GS services business that Leidos acquired in 2016.
Leidos originally won the contract in late June and SAIC followed up with a protest that was dismissed in August.
That first protest and dismissal were a little different in that NASA didn’t pull back the award from Leidos. NASA instead put things on hold while it looked at SAIC's protest challenging how the evaluation was conducted.
In August, SAIC argued that NASA’s corrective action didn’t address the protest and should not be dismissed. But GAO said the dismissal was warranted and that SAIC could protest again after NASA’s review. GAO did not rule on the merits of SAIC’s protest.
NASA came to the conclusion that the issues raised by SAIC didn’t impact the award to Leidos. So the award stands, pending the GAO decision that is expected by Feb. 10.