Air Force: KC-X contract start date is Nov. 12 - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

Air Force: KC-X contract start date is Nov. 12

The Air Force has changed its KC-X Request for Proposals to list a contract start date of Nov. 12 despite previous Pentagon announcements that the award for the $35 billion contract would be made in the early fall, according to an April 29 modification to the KC-X Request for Proposals posted on the Federal Business Opportunities website.

This comes about a month after the Defense Department announced that EADS would be granted an extra 60 days to put together a solo bid on the tanker. At the time, the Pentagon insisted that it would be accelerating its evaluation period in order to stick to the original target for a contract award.

The original contract award date listed in the amended RfP is Aug. 16.

That date, along with the term “contract award date,” is crossed out and replaced with the term “contract start date” and the Nov. 12 start time. The document does not make clear what the difference between the terms “award date” and “start date.”

A Boeing official who had seen the changes was unable to provide immediate insight into the difference between the terms. Officials from the Pentagon and EADS were not available for comment late May 3.

EADS requested a 90-day extension to the bidding period in late March after its former U.S. prime contractor on the project, Northrop Grumman, pulled out of the competition, claiming that the cost-focused request for proposals favored rival Boeing’s smaller 767-based design over EADS-Northrop’s Airbus A330-based entry.

On April 21, EADS North America officials announced that the European defense giant would take advantage of the Pentagon’s offer of an extension and submit a bid by early July. The original deadline to submit bids was May 10.