Date set for oral arguments in Oracle’s JEDI lawsuit
Oracle will finally get its day in court to be heard on why it thinks the Pentagon’s multibillion-dollar cloud computing acquisition is unfair and limits competition.
The Court of Federal Claims will hold oral arguments in Oracle’s case against the Department of Defense’s $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud contract July 10 in Washington, D.C., according to a new order from Judge Eric Bruggink.
At that hearing, Bruggink is expected to make a decision on the pre-bid protest, which Oracle first filed in December. Oracle also protested the contract with the Government Accountability Office last August, but it was ultimately denied in November 2018.
Oracle’s argument has always centered on its beliefs that DOD’s limiting of the contract to a single award is unlawful. But over time, its case has grown to make allegations of the Pentagon and contract frontrunner Amazon Web Services having conflicts of interest. Numerous times, DOD has cleared the contract of any such conflicts, but Oracle, as recent as this week, continues to press possible illicit connections between the military and AWS.
The court’s decision should close the book on Oracle’s JEDI protest, at least for a bit. If the ruling doesn’t favor Oracle, it’s all too likely the company will try again protesting the contract, likely after an award. Oracle has also taken to Capitol Hill, asking lawmakers to exercise “oversight authority regarding the JEDI procurement.”
With the case settled, DOD would soon after be cleared to make an award to one of the two vendors — Microsoft and AWS — that meet the procurement’s “competitive range” requirements.
