By Marina Malenic
The Air Force has only two qualified bidders for the KC-X aerial refueling tanker contract after an entry from a dark horse team offering a Ukrainian aircraft-based proposal was disqualified after delivering its bid five minutes past the Defense Department’s deadline for bid submissions, officials said yesterday.
“The bottom line is, they didn’t make it in time,” Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said of a U.S. Aerospace-Antonov attempt to bid. U.S. Aerospace, Inc., is a Southern California-based contractor that has teamed with Ukrainian state-owned company Antonovon the project.
Morrell said during a Pentagon press conference that the government has “very strict contracting rules that preclude consideration” of late bids.
The dismissal of the company’s bid has led to a protest by U.S. Aerospace. A formal protest with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) was filed Aug. 2. Company officials called the conduct of the Air Force officials “unreasonable” in that document. They have claimed that military personnel at the Aeronautical Systems Center at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, where bids were delivered, intentionally delayed their messengers from reaching the program office in time.
In an Aug. 4 Securities and Exchange Commission filing, U.S. Aerospace accused Air Force personnel of “intentionally” delaying delivery of the proposal “in order to create a pretext for refusing to consider it because they have political issues with our Eastern European supplier.”
Morrell called those allegations false.
“The notion that military personnel intentionally impeded the delivery of these documents is absolutely absurd,” he said.
He noted that the other two companies competing for the contract–Boeing [BA] and the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company (EADS)– “went to a great deal of trouble to deliver their bids ahead of the July 9, 2 p.m. EST deadline. EADS delivered its proposal both by airplane the day before and by van on the due date.
“Any professional contractor knows how hard and fast these deadlines are,” Morrell added. “It did not arrive in time, so we cannot review it, we cannot consider it.”
He said the Pentagon intends to “award this contract in the fall as we always said we would.”
U.S. Aerospace had requested an extension to the filing due date, but it was declined by the government. Along with Ukrainian partner Antonov, the company is proposing an An- 112 -based solution. Antonov is a state-owned manufacturer in the Ukraine.