Owl International Inc., d/b/a Global, a 1st Flagship Company

B-423281.4 Apr 24, 2026 Jump To FULL REPORT VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Owl International Inc., doing business as Global, a 1st Flagship Company, of Irvine, California, protests the terms of request for proposals (RFP) No. N00024-23-R-4304, issued by the Department of the Navy, Naval Sea Systems Command, for services to manage, operate, and maintain the Navy's emergency ship salvage material system and to support its oil and hazardous substance spill response program worldwide. The protester contends that the Navy has unjustifiably amended the RFP to remove a required provision, improperly limited final proposal revisions in response to that amendment, and failed to resolve an ambiguity in the solicitation. We sustain the protest in part and deny it in part. View Decision DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This redacted version has been approved for public release. Decision Matter of: Owl International Inc., d/b/a Global, a 1st Flagship Company File: B-423281.4 Date: April 24, 2026 Scott M. McCaleb, Esq., Gary S. Ward, Esq., William A. Roberts, III, Esq., Cara L. Sizemore, Esq., Teresita A. Regelbrugge, Esq., and Morgan W. Huston, Esq., Wiley Rein LLP, for the protester. Amy C. Hoang, Esq., Ashton P. Jones-Doherty, Esq., Edward V. Arnold, Esq., Sarah E. Barney, Esq., and Zachary F. Jacobson, Esq., Seyfarth Shaw LLP, for PCCI, Inc., the intervenor. Stuart J. Anderson, Esq., Rizlane Riahi, Esq., and Karrin Minott, Esq., Department of the Navy, for the agency. Paul N. Wengert, Esq., Todd C. Culliton, Esq., and Tania Calhoun, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Protest that agency improperly removed provision from solicitation providing for the evaluation of professional compensation is denied where the record showed a reasonable basis for the agency's determination that performance of the requirement would not require meaningful numbers of professional employees. 2. Protest that agency unreasonably restricted offerors to revising only their cost/price proposals is sustained where the record shows the effect of amending the solicitation to remove the evaluation of professional compensation would have a material impact on aspects of an offeror's technical proposal and where the solicitation provided that a proposal could be rejected if the cost/price proposal was inconsistent with the technical proposal. 3. Protest that the solicitation contained a latent ambiguity is denied where the terms of the solicitation were subject to only one reasonable reading. DECISION Owl International Inc., doing business as Global, a 1st Flagship Company, of Irvine, California, protests the terms of request for proposals (RFP) No. N00024-23-R-4304, issued by the Department of the Navy, Naval Sea Systems Command, for services to manage, operate, and maintain the Navy's emergency ship salvage material system and to support its oil and hazardous substance spill response program worldwide. The protester contends that the Navy has unjustifiably amended the RFP to remove a required provision, improperly limited final proposal revisions in response to that amendment, and failed to resolve an ambiguity in the solicitation. We sustain the protest in part and deny it in part. BACKGROUND The RFP, issued September 28, 2023, requested proposals to provide services to support the Navy's emergency ship salvage material system under a single indefinite‑delivery, indefinite-quantity contract for five consecutive 1‑year ordering periods. Agency Report (AR), Tab 2, Conformed RFP through amend. 6 at 1-3. The RFP established a maximum contract value of $315 million. Id. at 3. Proposals were to be evaluated under three factors, in descending order of importance: technical capability, past performance, and cost/price. Id. at 110. When combined, the technical capability and past performance factors were significantly more important than cost/price. Id. As it relates to cost/price, the Navy organized the required work into operational tasks and non-operational tasks, and provided that the contract would be priced on a cost-plus-award-fee basis for operational tasks, and on a cost-plus-fixed-fee basis for non-operational tasks. Id. at 2. Under the cost/price factor, the RFP required offerors to submit a spreadsheet pricing schedule with fully burdened hourly labor rates for various listed labor categories by performance location. Id. at 20. For work performed by personnel under those labor categories, the contractor would be paid at the corresponding rate. Id. at 5. Additionally, among a list of standard provisions incorporated in the RFP was Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) provision 52.222-46.