Blue Origin, the company created by the world's richest man Jeff Bezos, has filed a lawsuit against NASA. This lawsuit is a continuation of Blue Origin's protest that it still does not accept NASA's decision to award the contract for the moon landing system to SpaceX led by Elon Musk.
The lawsuit was filed in federal court in the United States on Monday (16/8). In the sealed lawsuit, Blue Origin argued that NASA's proposal evaluation process was unlawful and inappropriate.
"Blue Origin filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in an attempt to correct deficiencies in the acquisition process in NASA's Human Landing System," said a Blue Origin spokesperson, as quoted by TechCrunch, Wednesday (18/8/2021).
"We strongly believe that the issues discovered in this procurement and its results must be addressed to restore justice, create competition, and ensure the safe return of the United States to the Moon."
The Human Landing System (HLS) is an important part of NASA's Artemis mission, which plans to land astronauts on the Moon in 2024. HLS itself is a lander system that will land astronauts on the Moon's surface.
In April, NASA awarded SpaceX a $2.9 billion HLS contract. NASA initially wanted to award contracts to two companies, but their budgets were cut by the US Congress so that only one company was chosen.
A few weeks later, Blue Origin and Dynetics, the third company competing for the HLS contract, filed separate complaints with the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Both argued that NASA should award contracts to the two companies.
GAO later defended NASA's decision and said it was fair and the US space agency was entitled to award multiple contracts, one contract, or none.
When GAO announced its decision, it seemed clear that SpaceX won and Blue Origin lost. But this lawsuit shows that Blue Origin has not given up pursuing the contract.
As the founder of Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos even went as far as to offer NASA $2 billion if they awarded the contract to his company.
Blue Origin also criticized SpaceX's Starship rocket system, which will take astronauts to the Moon, in an infographic posted on its website. In the infographic, Blue Origin called Starship an overly complex and high-risk system. With this lawsuit, the feud between Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk entered a new chapter after being insinuated with each other.