News & Thought Leadership

Article by: Nicholas Hopkins, Associate Emerging government contractors seeking to break into the defense marketplace should keep an eye on new programs being rolled out by The Department of War’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU). To encourage greater participation from commercial technology companies, DIU is launching initiatives designed to reduce some of the most significant...

1. GAO upholds security-clearance requirements at proposal submission October 30 | GAO In Sawdey Solution Services, Inc., GAO rejected a challenge to an Air Force solicitation requiring offerors to hold a TOP SECRET facility clearance with SECRET safeguarding capability when submitting proposals. GAO found the requirements reasonably related to the agency’s immediate classified-performance needs....

Article by: Nicholas Hopkins, Associate Government contract transitions inevitably involve conflicting incentives. The agency wants continuity of quality service. The successor contractor wants to retain experienced and knowledgeable personnel. The incumbent contractor wants to protect its workforce and business interests, and prevent its employees from strengthening a competitor. And the incumbent workers typically want...

Here are there "top 5" stories we are tracking this week: 1. GSA and SBA launch audits of 689 contractors October 21 | GSA GSA announced that it is auditing federal contracts held by 689 firms following their suspension from SBA’s 8(a) program. According to the announcement, the contracts have a collective ceiling of...

Article by: Tyson Marx, Partner If you follow GAO bid protest decisions the way some people follow sports (*ahem, Mary Pat Buckenmeyer*), you recently were treated to a good one. Ares Enterprise, LLC, B-424548 et al., is one of those decisions that manages to touch just about every hot-button issue in the federal procurement...

Article by: Tyson Marx, Partner The dispute between Anthropic and the federal government has dominated government contracting headlines over the past several months. Without getting caught up in the politics of the situation, this blogpost gives contractors who use and rely on Anthropic products like Claude what they need to know to avoid any...