The U.S. Government Accountability Office rejected Jan. 5 a protest filed by Sierra Nevada Corp. (SNC) of commercial crew development contracts NASA awarded in September to two other companies. In a statement, Ralph O. White, managing associate general counsel for procurement law at GAO, said that the agency had rejected claims by Sierra Nevada regarding the Sept. 16 award of Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) contracts to Boeing and SpaceX. Sierra Nevada filed its protest Sept. 26, asserting that its proposal had technical merits similar to the winning companies but at a lower cost than at least one of them. In a statement issued the same day as the protest, the company claimed there were "serious questions and inconsistencies in the source selection process." The deadline for the GAO to rule on the protest was Jan. 5. The GAO, in its statement, said Sierra Nevada argued that NASA had improperly deviated from the CCtCap selection criteria by "significantly elevating" the goal of having a crew system certified to carry astronauts by the end of 2017, and not communicating that goal to the bidding companies. "GAO disagreed with Sierra Nevada's arguments about NASA's evaluation, and found no undue emphasis on NASA's consideration of each offerer's proposed schedule, and likelihood to achieve crew transportation system certification not later than 2017," White said in the statement. He added that the GAO found that NASA's request for proposals for CCtCap made clear the 2017 goal of certification.
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机译：美国政府问责局于1月5日拒绝了内华达山脉公司（SNC）提出的抗议，该抗议是针对美国宇航局9月份授予另外两家公司的商业机组开发合同。 GAO采购法总经理助理拉尔夫·怀特（Ralph O. White）在一份声明中表示，该机构已拒绝内华达山脉（Sierra Nevada）关于9月16日授予波音和SpaceX商业船员运输能力（CCtCap）合同的要求。内华达山脉（Sierra Nevada）于9月26日提出抗议，称其提议具有与获胜公司相似的技术优势，但成本至少低于其中一家。在抗议的同一天发表的一份声明中，该公司声称“在来源选择过程中存在严重的问题和不一致之处”。 GAO裁决抗议的最后期限是1月5日。GAO在声明中说，内华达山脉辩护说，NASA通过“显着提高”使乘员组获得认证的目标而偏离了CCtCap选择标准。到2017年底运载宇航员，并且没有将目标传达给竞标公司。怀特在声明中说：“美国宇航局不同意内华达山脉关于美国宇航局评估的论点，并没有过分强调美国宇航局对每个提议者的拟议时间表的考虑，并且不迟于2017年获得机组人员运输系统认证的可能性。”他补充说，GAO发现NASA对CCtCap提案的要求明确了2017年认证目标。
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