Cost of Reinventing Wheel Just Went Up

A judge ruled that the government must consider buying commercial products before contracting to develop a similar product.

This has been common practice in the military for decades – paying a contractor $10,000 for a toilet seat that sells at Lowes for $640.  See https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/the-air-forces-10000-toilet-cover/2018/07/14/c33d325a-85df-11e8-8f6c-46cb43e3f306_story.html

So, for instance, if there is a patented spatial aiming shooting simulator available commercially, the government cannot ignore it or pay a contractor to reverse engineer it. The landmark case on this was in 2018 Palantir vs US

https://www.defensenews.com/land/2019/03/29/palantir-who-successfully-sued-the-army-just-won-a-major-army-contract/

A recent court decision addressed the government’s attempt to circumvent FASA by awarding a contract to develop a product that was already commercially available.

https://tinyurl.com/2p8t9s4w