On Friday, may 17, lawyers space company SpaceX filed in U.S. Federal court lawsuit, the defendant in which acts of the government.
Space lawyers of the company had asked the court not to disclose the text of the filed court document because it contains «confidential and proprietary information.» The decision to classify an enforceable document or not will have to take the court. The case was transferred to judge Lydia Kay Griggsby.
The reason for the lawsuit is to fight for contracts to launch satellites nacobre, the Washington Post reported. This conclusion publication made on the basis that the US air force is now beginning to prepare major contracts, worth several billion dollars on space launches. With the contractor the Department of defense will be determined in 2020.
The Washington Post writes that last year, SpaceX lost the contract for the financing of missiles for launches of military satellites. In the competition was attended by several aerospace companies. In the end, contracts worth more than $2 billion was received by the competitors SpaceX, Blue Origin (owned by Amazon founder Jeffrey Bezos the), Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems and United Launch Alliance (ULA).
This is not the first case when SpaceX is suing the US government: the most famous case occurred in 2014, when SpaceX protested because of the decision of the air force to contract for the production of 36 rocket stages with United Launch Alliance, as she was the only one certified to launch rockets to the tasks of national security. Then the US air force has developed an agreement on the certification of SpaceX and the company withdrew their claims.
In February of this year, SpaceX has also sued due to the NASA contract, worth $150 million to develop equipment for a future mission to Jupiter. The contract was awarded to the same ULA. However, 2 months after filing a lawsuit SpaceX abandoned the claims without explanation.
But in both cases, the company Elon musk claimed could perform the contracts for a much lower price.
