User 249704

Boeing Drags Its Heels on Air Force Bid

Let me get this straight.

1) After the Boeing/Druyun fiasco, Air Force wants to replace tankers and now needs a competition with at least two bidders.
2) Air Force releases a "solicitation" (draft Request For Proposal) to the two only interested parties, Boeing and Northrop.
3) Boeing and Northrop check out the draft RFP.
3) Northrop takes a look and says that draft RFP in current form does not warrant them to develop a bid (not to be confused with "pulling out" since they have not yet agreed to participate.
4) Air Force amends RFP (to both Boeing and Northrop) to make it fair and to allow Northrop to participate in the bidding process.
5) Unlike most analysts, Northrop now thinks it has a real, albeit outside chance of winning.
Important to Note here: Air Force doesn't know what Northrop's bid will contain, therefore it's impossible for them to slant the RFP towards Northrop - right?
6) Boeing and Northrop agree in writing with final RFP and its fairness.
7) Both parties submit bids to the Air Force.
8) Air Force evaluates bids and, against all odds, Northrop wins the competition with a product offering more bangs for bucks.
8) Boeing is shocked - it never in their wildest dreams occurred to them that they could lose this one.
9) Boeing launches protest with the GAO, claiming that the rules were changed midway through the competition to unfairly favor Northrop. (this refers to the amendment the Air Force made to the draft RFP to allow Northrop to compete in the first place. Boeing delivered a bid and as such must have agreed to the final RFP wording. This is not midway through the competition but PRIOR to the competition).
10) GAO upholds 8 points in Boeing's protest and Air Force agrees to let the Pentagon deal with the problem.
11) Pentagon drafts clarifications to RFP relating to the 8 points of contention and allows competitors to submit revised bids addressing these 8 points only - i.e not a completely new competition.
12) Boeing, knowing now a lot more about Northrop's bid and why it won, threatens to not submit a revised bid (reported by the media wrongly as Boeing pulling out of the competition. They cannot pull out anymore since they are already in the midst of it - protest and all. All they can do is to fail amending their bid...in which case the Pentagon should evaluate the 8 points in the (revised) bids as submitted by the new deadline). Boeing still may win because costs are calculated over 40 years instead of 25.

Sounds all fair to me so far. It would however be extremely unfair to allow either competitor to enter an entirely new product whilst knowing that their original proposal has failed. This is then called a "Dutch Auction".

BTW, both competitors are American entries and have qualified to bid under the "Buy American" rules.