There were no protests against the contract award for management and operations of the Sandia National Laboratories, the National Nuclear Security Administration said Wednesday.
The semiautonomous branch of the U.S. Energy Department announced on Dec. 16 that it had awarded the contract to National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia (NTESS), a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International. The deal is worth $2.6 billion per year over a decade, including all options.
NTESS beat at least two other bidders: a team encompassing Lockheed Martin (Sandia’s current operations prime) and Purdue, New Mexico State, and New Mexico Tech universities; and a partnership of Battelle, Boeing, the University of New Mexico, the Texas A&M University System, and the University of Texas System. All losing bidders had 10 days after being formally briefed on the decision to file a protest with the Government Accountability Office; that period has passed, NNSA spokesman Greg Wolf said Wednesday.
The GAO said it had not received any protests. Meanwhile, NTESS as of last week received NNSA authorization to begin transition activities to take over management of the lab on May 1. That could not have happened if there were protests on file, Wolf noted.
“Lockheed Martin will not protest the Sandia M&O contract award,” company spokesman Matt Kramer said by email Wednesday. “Sandia’s mission is critical to national security, and we’ll work with the incoming contractor to ensure a smooth transition. We are proud of our 23 years of service to Sandia and the NNSA, and we thank Sandia’s employees for their dedication and innovation.”
Sandia National Laboratories, with locations in New Mexico, California, Hawaii, and Nevada, conducts non-nuclear engineering development for nuclear weapons, develops systems that ensure the reliability of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, and supports the manufacturing and disassembly of nuclear weapons, among other technical nonproliferation and treaty verification support activities. The sites employ a total of roughly 10,000 employees.