Northrop says confident in US Air Force bomber award process

Lockheed Martin said it filed a protest with the US Court of Federal Claims on 17 December about the award of the Pentagon’s Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) programme to Oshkosh Defense. It is unknown if Lockheed is seeking an injunction that would force Oshkosh to again cease work.

As part of the decision, the US Army’s Tank-automotive and Armaments Command (TACOM) Life Cycle Management Command (LCMC) has allowed Oshkosh to resume work on the JLTV production contract.

The lawsuit comes one day after a defense industry source revealed to Talk Business & Politics that the U.S. Army recently came forward with “a large volume of previously undisclosed documents not produced prior to the GAO hearing that would have materially affected the case, including the testimony and cross-examination of government witnesses”. The GAO then rejected Lockheed’s protest, citing the company’s filing of a notice of intent to sue.

Lockheed filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in August.

“We look forward to having our Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) complaint heard, and all evidence evaluated, by the Court of Federal Claims”, Lockheed said in a statement.

After the Army and Marine Corps awarded a contract worth up to $6.75 billion to Oshkosh on August 25, Lockheed Martin protested the decision.

“We are now even more confident that the Air Force followed an extraordinarily thorough and careful selection process and picked the right team in Northrop Grumman”, Northrop spokesman Randy Belote said.

But new Army-supplied information that emerged toward the end of the GAO’s protest process led Lockheed to consider moving its protest to federal court.

Lockheed Martin officials refused to comment for this story.

The is a follow-up to the legacy HMMWV, or Humvee, fleet utilized by each the U.S. Military and U.S.