Link: GAO Opinion
Agency: Department of the Air Force
Disposition: Protest denied.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
GAO Digest:
Protest that agency unreasonably evaluated proposals is denied where the agency provided a detailed report responding to the evaluation challenges raised by the protester, yet the protester failed to meaningfully comment on the agency’s detailed defense.
General Counsel P.C. Highlight:
RTGX challenges its marginal ratings under the technical approach and management approach factors. GAO states that in reviewing a protest against an agency’s evaluation of proposals, GAO will not reevaluate proposals, but instead will examine the record to determine whether the agency’s judgment was reasonable and consistent with the stated evaluation criteria and applicable procurement statutes and regulations. A protester’s mere disagreement with the agency’s judgment in its evaluation does not establish that the evaluation was unreasonable.
The agency asserts that it carefully considered the protester’s proposal and properly concluded that it failed to meet the requirements of “standard 2” under subfactor 1, of the technical approach factor. In this regard, the agency report identifies specific proposal shortcomings from the contemporaneous evaluation. Under the management factor, the agency report, again, discussed numerous, specific evaluated shortcomings in the protester’s proposal, to include, among others, the protester’s failure to adequately address “standard 6” under subfactor 1, of the management approach factor. In its comments on the agency report, the protester’s substantive response to the agency’s analysis, in its entirety, was that “RTGX has previously addressed the merits of these protest grounds in its initial protest, which RTGX incorporates herein by reference, and respectfully requests that the GAO issue a decision on the current record.” A protester bears the burden of proving that an evaluation was unreasonable, and mere disagreement with the agency does not render the evaluation unreasonable. Given RTGX’s failure to meaningfully dispute, or even address, the agency’s detailed defense of its evaluation of the protester’s proposal under the challenged criteria, GAO has no basis to conclude that the agency’s assessment was unreasonable. The protest is denied.