Ekagra Partners, LLC v. U. S. and Paradyme Management, Inc., No. 22-1038C, December 21, 2022.

[bob7947]

This is an opinion by Judge Solomson of the Court of Federal Claims.  It may save a potential protester thousands of dollars just by reading it.  It takes about 15 minutes to get the idea.

Quote

This Court does not examine procurement decisions with an electron scanning microscope, searching for the slightest of imperfections. As Judge Tapp recently noted, “even ‘violations of law,’ let alone innocuous mistakes, should not result in setting aside awards unless those mistakes have some significance, for ‘[a]ny good lawyer can pick lint off any Government procurement.’”¹ In this case, Plaintiff, Ekagra Parnters, LLC (“Ekagra”), has the burden to allege and then prove that Defendant, the United States — acting by and through the United States Census Bureau (“Census” or “USCB”) — not only committed some error in awarding the contract at issue to the Defendant-Intervenor, Paradyme Management, Inc. (“Paradyme”), but also that any such error prejudiced Ekagra. Ekagra, however, alleges procurement errors that are more akin to dust particles than troublesome lint.

¹ Ginn Grp., Inc. v. United States, 159 Fed. Cl. 593, 608 (2022) (alteration in original) (quoting Andersen Consulting v. United States, 959 F.2d 929, 932 (Fed. Cir. 1992)); see also Caddell Constr. Co. v. United States, 129 Fed. Cl. 383, 403–04 (2016). This Court similarly observed in a recent decision that a plaintiff’s “questions” regarding the conduct of a procurement “do not substitute for the evidence necessary to succeed on the merits.” Ahtna Logistics, LLC v. United States, -- Fed. Cl. --, 2022 WL 17480642, at *1 (Fed. Cl. Nov. 28, 2022) (describing “prejudice on the merits” as “an issue, in this Court’s experience, to which plaintiffs all-too-often do not pay sufficient attention, usually at their own peril”).

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Ekagra Partners, LLC v. U. S. and Paradyme Management, Inc., No. 22-1038C, December 21, 2022

[Vern Edwards]

I love Solomson. He doesn't mince words.

[formerfed]

5 hours ago, bob7947 said:

This is an opinion by Judge Solomson of the Court of Federal Claims.  It may save a potential protester thousands of dollars just by reading it.  It takes about 15 minutes to get the idea.

Any experienced business development person working for a company should know it’s tough to displace an incumbent.  The protestor should have done their due diligence first to determine if the customer agency is happy with the incumbent.  There’s a level of comfort with an incumbent and if an incumbent is performing well, an offeror wishing to win has to offer something different and enticing and demonstrate confidence in delivery.  With three significant weaknesses, it appears they failed to do so.