Skip to main content

Decision on Bid Protest by Navistar Defense and BAE Systems Regarding Army Truck Award to Oshkosh

WASHINGTON, D.C. (December 14, 2009)—The following is a statement by Michael R. Golden, GAO’s managing associate general counsel for procurement law, regarding the bid protest decision resolving the family of medium tactical vehicles protest by Navistar Defense, LLC and BAE Systems, Tactical Vehicle Systems LP, B-401865 et al., December 14, 2009

"Our Office sustained, or upheld, the protests today. Our review of the record led us to conclude that the Army’s evaluation was flawed with regard to the evaluation of Oshkosh’s proposal under the capability evaluation factor, and the evaluation of Navistar’s past performance. We therefore sustained Navistar’s and BAE’s protests. We also denied a number of Navistar’s and BAE’s challenges to the award to Oshkosh, including challenges to the evaluation of Oshkosh’s price.

We recommended that the Army: reevaluate the offerors’ proposals under the capability evaluation factor, in a manner consistent with the terms of the solicitation; conduct a new evaluation of Navistar’s past performance that adequately documents the agency’s judgments; and make a new selection decision. We also recommended that if, at the conclusion of the reevaluation, Oshkosh is not found to offer the best value, the agency should terminate Oshkosh’s contract for the convenience of the government. We further recommend that Navistar and BAE be reimbursed the costs of filing and pursuing the successful grounds of their protests related to their challenge of technical and past performance evaluation issues, including reasonable attorney fees. By statute, the Army has 60 days to inform our Office of its actions in response to our recommendations.

Navistar Defense, LLC, of Warrenville, Illinois, and BAE Systems, Tactical Vehicle Systems LP, of Sealy, Texas, protested the award of a contract to Oshkosh Corporation, of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, under request for proposals (RFP) No. W56HZV-09-R-0083, issued by the Department of the Army, U.S. Army Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command, for production of the family of medium tactical vehicles (FMTV). Navistar and BAE challenged the Army’s evaluation of the offerors’ technical and price proposals, and contend that the selection decision was flawed.

The Army received proposals and conducted negotiations with Oshkosh, Navistar, and BAE. The agency selected Oshkosh’s proposal for award on August 26, 2009, and Navistar and BAE each filed a protest with our Office on September 4 and 5, respectively, with each supplementing its protest several times thereafter. In accordance with our Bid Protest Regulations, we obtained a report from the agency and comments on that report from Oshkosh, Navistar, and BAE. Our Office also conducted a hearing on November 9 and 10, at which testimony was received from a number of Army witnesses about the record. Following the hearing, we received further comments from the parties, addressing the hearing testimony as well as other aspects of the record.

Our decision should not be read to reflect a view as to the merits of the firms' respective approaches to produce the FMTV. Judgments about which offeror will most successfully meet governmental needs are largely reserved for the procuring agencies, subject only to such statutory and regulatory requirements as full and open competition and fairness to potential offerors. Our bid protest process examines whether procuring agencies have complied with those requirements.

The decision was issued under a protective order because the decision contains proprietary and source selection sensitive information. We have directed counsel for the parties to promptly identify information that cannot be publicly released so that we can expeditiously prepare and release, as soon as possible, a public version of the decision."

Information about GAO’s bid protest process can be found at www.gao.gov.
For further information please contact Mr. Golden at 202-512-4788.

#####

Navistar Defense, LLC; BAE Systems, Tactical Vehicle Systems LP
B-401865; B-401865.2; B-401865.3; B-401865.4; B-401865.5; B-401865.6; B-401865.7, December 14, 2009
Summary (HTML) Full Decision (PDF, 24 pages) Full Decision (HTML)

Next Release:

GAO Names New Head of Its Office of Opportunity and Inclusiveness

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Sept. 24, 2009)—The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has announced that Reginald Jones, a labor and employment attorney and former Commissioner of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), has joined the legislative branch support agency as Managing Director of its Office of Opportunity and Inclusiveness.