A federal judge decided to put on hold until Aug. 17 a lawsuit filed by Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) challenging the Department of Defense’s decision to award Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) the potential 10-year, $10B Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure cloud computing contract, Reuters reported Saturday.
Judge Patricia Campbell-Smith of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims moved to grant DoD’s request to stop further action on the case to pave the way for the Pentagon to reassess certain aspects of its JEDI contract award decision. The judge’s order could be shortened or extended depending on the review.
The Pentagon asked the judge in early April to approve its motion for a 120-day remand to review the decision.
DoD’s office of inspector general issued a report dated April 13 concluding that the contract award was consistent with federal acquisition laws and policies. However, the IG office said it could not fully review allegations of White House influence on the JEDI procurement process after the administration asserted a “presidential communications privilege” that precluded some senior Pentagon officials from directly responding to the IG office’s questions.
