Neither company wants to talk about the brief challenge regarding the data analytics contract. Two unlikely competitors – Palantir and Carahsoft – came close to squaring off over a nearly $400 million contract with the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Palantir won the $385.4 million contract on the last day of federal fiscal year 2025 – Sept. 30 to be exact – and the government shut down the next day. Since 2007, Palantir has provided a software-as-a-service solution to the VA that collects and structures data to support decision-making processes.
The government reopened on Nov. 13 and Carahsoft filed a bid protest the same day at the Government Accountability Office.
Carahsoft argued that VA did not properly evaluate technical proposals and relied on unstated evaluation criteria. The IT product reseller also said VA did not conduct a proper lowest price, technically acceptable determination and did not follow applicable statutes and regulations.
The challenge had all the markings of a nice fight between two well-known opponents with very different business models. But Carahsoft withdrew its protest on Friday and GAO formally approved the move on Tuesday. VA never even had to weigh in with its side of the story.
No officials at either Palantir or Carahsoft have responded to requests for comment on why the protest and the quick withdrawal. Companies are not required to tell GAO why they are withdrawing either.
It is a long shot that we’ll ever learn much more, but these two competitors are not what we usually consider as head-to-head competitors. Carahsoft is the largest value-added distributor in the federal market, while Palantir is a major software provider specializing in data integration and analytics platforms for government agencies.
We expect companies like them to be partners, instead of facing off on opposite sides of a protest.
Carahsoft also rarely files bid protests. GAO’s docket only goes back 12 months and there are no Carahsoft protests besides this one. In searching our archives, the most recent Carahsoft protest we can find was filed in 2014.
So, are Carahsoft and Palantir competitors? Partners? Both? Or was filing a protest just an error that they tried to quickly correct? If they would just respond, we might get some answers.
]]>
