Competitive Range Of One Gets Close Scrutiny

Reviewing the law that an agency's narrowing the competitive range to one results in close scrutiny, the CFC in L-3 Communications Eotech, Inc. v. U.S. (Sept. 23, 2008, http://www.crowell.com/pdf/L3-Communications_v_US-AimPoint_08-515.pdf) proceeded to set aside such a determination when the agency disqualified the protestor based on a failed functional test that it relaxed for the favored offeror. The court, after seeing a live demonstration of the hardware involved, also found irrational the agency's failure to seek clarifications when the protestor's perceived testing problem could have been corrected relatively easily.