None of the losing bidders for the Defense Department's massive electronic health-record contract have challenged the decision to award it to Cerner Corp. and its team last month.
The regular protest period for competing bidders to challenge the award has ended, clearing the path for the developer to go forward with the planned EHR deployment, expected to begin next year.
A Defense Department spokeswoman confirmed no challenges have been filed.
The military announced July 29 that the team led by Leidos (as the prime contractor), Cerner and Accenture Federal Services had won the contract, initially valued with a “ceiling” of just over $4.33 billion.
Typically, such protests must be filed with the Government Accountability Office “within 10 days of when a protester knows or should know of the basis of the protest."
The contract was for an initial two-year period, with a pair of three-year option periods, and a possible two-year “award term,” bringing the total possible contract period to 10 years.
A military official estimated the total life-cycle cost of the project, called the Defense Healthcare Management Systems Modernization procurement effort, or DHMSM, was expected to be about $9 billion.
The new EHR system will be used in 55 hospitals and 600 clinics, and was chosen after a 22-month procurement effort. The military health system serves 9.5 million active duty and retired military personnel and their families.
There were six bidders on the contract, according to the military, but only four disclosed their efforts. The military declined to name the other two bidders.
The other known bidders were teams consisting of Epic Systems Corp. and IBM Corp.; Allscripts, Computer Sciences Corp., and Hewlett-Packard; and DSS, Medsphere, PricewaterhouseCoopers and General Dynamics Information Technology.
“After a debrief from the government, Allscripts, in consultation with CSC, HP and our other partners, has decided not to protest the DHMSM award,” said Allscripts spokeswoman Concetta DiFranco. “We wish the program much success and look forward to working with the Leidos team to connect our 180,000 physicians in hospitals and physician practices across the country who see Military Health (System) patients every day with the new system as it is deployed.”
Epic CEO Judith Faulkner deferred comment to the team's prime contractor, IBM. An IBM spokesperson was unavailable for comment at deadline.
No protest is good news for Cerner shareholders, removing the uncertainty of a challenge, said Charles Rhyee, managing director and senior analyst specializing in healthcare distribution and technology for Cowen and Company, a New York City stock brokerage.
“In my mind, to the extent people thought there was some overhang, this should clear it up,” Rhyee said.
