By Feuer
Jeff Bezos’ space company, Blue Origin, sued the National Aeronautics and Space Administration over the agency’s decision to award a $2.9 billion moon lander contract to Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
The lawsuit, filed Friday n the US Court of Federal Claims in Washington, DC, marks an escalation of Blue Origin’s protests over the contract, which was awarded to SpaceX in April.
“This bid protest challenges NASA’s unlawful and improper evaluation of proposals,” Blue Origin said in its court filing.
Blue Origin’s lawsuit remains sealed and NASA must file a response to the challenge by Oct. 12.
“We firmly believe that the issues identified in this procurement and its outcomes must be addressed to restore fairness, create competition, and ensure a safe return to the Moon for America,” a Blue Origin spokesperson said in a statement.
Monica Witt, a NASA spokeswoman, said that “officials are currently reviewing details of the case.”
“NASA is committed to the Artemis program and to maintaining the nation’s global leadership in space exploration,” she added. “With our partners, we will go to the Moon and stay to enable science investigations, develop new technology, and create high paying jobs for the greater good and in preparation to send astronauts to Mars.
“As soon as possible, the agency will provide an update on the way forward for returning to the Moon as quickly and as safely as possible under Artemis,” she said.
It’s Blue Origin’s latest bid to get NASA to award them a second contract for the so-called Human Lander System, which the agency had originally suggested it would do.
Blue Origin, SpaceX and Dynetics, a subsidiary of Leidos, had all bid on the contract for the system, which is seen as a key part of NASA’s plan to return American astronauts to the moon by 2024.
But in an April surprise, NASA awarded a single $2.89 billion contract to Musk’s SpaceX tasking the company with building the next crewed lunar lander.
Blue Origin quickly filed a formal complaint with the Government Accountability Office arguing that they were not given a chance to revise their price during the competition, unlike SpaceX.
But last month, the GAO said it “denied the protest arguments that NASA acted improperly in making a single award to SpaceX.”
In another attempt to get in on the project, Blue Origin about three weeks ago offered to cover billions in costs if NASA would award it a parallel contract to the one SpaceX received.
Bezos wrote in a letter to NASA administrator Bill Nelson Blue Origin would waive up to $2 billion in payments in the first couple years of the contract.
He also said the company would pay for a demonstration mission to low-Earth orbit if the agency were to award the company a fixed-price Human Landing System contract.
“We stand ready to help NASA moderate its technical risks and solve its budgetary constraints and put the Artemis Program back on a more competitive, credible, and sustainable path,” Bezos wrote in the letter.
And since then, Blue Origin has ramped up its jabs at SpaceX, releasing an infographic last week that said SpaceX’s Starship rocket is “a launch vehicle that has never flown to orbit and is still being designed.”
