AT&T adds protest to DREN deal

In a bit of a deja vu scenario, one more unsuccessful bidder for the $450 million Defense Research and Engineering Network contract has protested the award.

With its announcement April 22, incumbent vendor AT&T became the third of the four unsuccessful vendors to file a protest over the Defense Information Systems Agency's contract award to WorldCom Inc.

"We don't believe that our proposal was evaluated fairly and reasonably," AT&T spokesman Jim Byrnes said.

DISA already had put work under the contract on hold after protests by Global Crossing Ltd. and Sprint. Only Qwest Communications International Inc. has not yet filed a protest of the much-watched contract.

The story seems familiar. Last year, DISA awarded the DREN contract to Global Crossing and then withdrew the offer after the competing vendors filed protests.

This time around, Sprint filed a protest April 12 and Global Crossing followed suit on April 15.

DREN is designed to offer enhanced connectivity to all DOD research communities, providing wide-area network services to support DOD's High Performance Computing Modernization Program.

AT&T's existing contract had been set to expire last year. DOD and AT&T negotiated a short-term contract to continue providing services until the new contract takes effect.