GAO Rejects Sikorsky’s Protest Over Army’s FLRAA Contract

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has denied a protest filed by Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation, a subsidiary of Lockheed Martin, challenging the award of a lucrative Army helicopter contract to Bell Textron, Inc. The contract, worth up to $7 billion, is for the development of the Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA), a new vertical lift aircraft that will replace the UH-60 Black Hawk utility fleet.

The FLRAA program is part of the Army's Future Vertical Lift initiative, which aims to modernize its aviation capabilities with faster, more agile and more survivable aircraft. The Army wanted FLRAA to have a maximum continuous cruise speed of 280 knots, an unrefueled combat radius of 300 nautical miles, and a passenger capacity of 12 troops.

Sikorsky, in partnership with Boeing, submitted its SB-1 Defiant coaxial-rotor compound helicopter as its FLRAA proposal. The SB-1 Defiant has demonstrated a speed of over 245 knots, according to a Boeing statement. Efforts to find a credible range figure prior to publication were unsuccessful.

Bell offered its V-280 Valor tiltrotor aircraft as its FLRAA bid. The V-280 Valor has achieved a speed of over 300 knots and a range of over 200 nautical miles in flight tests, with one ferry flight of over 370 miles, according to Bell.

The V-280 tiltrotor is smaller but similar in many ways to the company's earlier V-22 Osprey tiltrotor built for the Marines, Air Force, Navy, and some foreign government sales. Unlike the Osprey, the Valor's rotors and some transmission components pivot (tilt), but not the gas turbine engines which remain fixed in place. In the V-22 Osprey, the entire engine/transmission/rotor system tilt. See this documentary for more about tiltrotor technology: V-22 Osprey history video

The Army awarded the FLRAA contract to Bell in December 2022, after evaluating both proposals under several criteria, including engineering design and development, product supportability and cost/price. The Army found Sikorsky's proposal to be technically unacceptable, as it did not provide sufficient architectural details to meet the requirements.

Sikorsky filed a protest with the GAO in January 2023, alleging that the Army's evaluation was unreasonable, inconsistent and biased. Sikorsky also claimed that Bell's proposal was also technically unacceptable and that the Army's best-value tradeoff decision was flawed.

However, the GAO denied and dismissed Sikorsky's protest on April 6, 2023, after reviewing the record and conducting a hearing. The GAO concluded that the Army reasonably evaluated Sikorsky's proposal as unacceptable and that Sikorsky was no longer an interested party to challenge the award to Bell.

The GAO also denied Sikorsky's various allegations regarding Bell's proposal, the cost/price evaluation and the best-value tradeoff decision. The GAO found no evidence of any violation of procurement law or regulation by the Army.

With the GAO's decision, Bell can proceed with its FLRAA contract without further delay. Bell is expected to deliver two prototype aircraft by 2026 and begin low-rate initial production by 2030. The Army plans to acquire about 300 FLRAA aircraft by 2035.