Communicating the Sour Grapes of Lost Profit

"[Canadian soldiers who performed the product evaluation] lacked the necessary expertise [and they based their evaluation on undisclosed criteria]. Aspects of the evaluation process raise a reasonable apprehension of bias."
Raytheon Canada complaint to the Canadian International Trade Tribunal

"They [Raytheon] most certainly cast aspersions on their [Canadian military personnel] work and personal integrity. We do not know how this has individually affected them [military personnel], but it is shameful that they were targeted in the first place." 
"Good faith must be presumed, and unfounded accusations discouraged."
"Because of the nature of the work of public servants and members of the Canadian Forces, and their commitment to Canada, until there are serious and real grounds to believe otherwise, the Tribunal would hope that they are all treated with respect."
Canadian International Trade Tribunal

File   An undated photo of Canadian soldiers during a drill at Garrison Petawawa

Soldiers from Garrison Petawawa in Ontario were tasked with evaluating equipment meant for the Canadian military's Integrated Soldier System Project. This equipment in particular represented a battlefield communications system produced by Raytheon. This is critical equipment that those testing understood that their lives could depend on its reliability of performance and they found it wanting.

Raytheon was rather more than displeased that its equipment was rejected and decided to complain to the trade tribunal. The contract was awarded to Rheinmetall Canada of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu whose equipment did meet the criteria and satisfaction of the soldiers who tested it as reliable battlefield communications equipment. That award was an initial $7-million which would eventually be valued up to $250-million.

Once it realized it had lost the competition, Raytheon filed their complaint claiming that the Garrison Petawawa soldiers in collusion with authorities from Public Works the federal authorizing agency for procurement had failed to respect proper procedures in the evaluation of Raytheon's bid. That the evaluation of their equipment was "arbitrary and imprecise".

Raytheon wanted the tribunal to have the Rheinmetall contract cancelled, and the bids re-evaluated by the federal government. After due consideration the trade tribunal reached the conclusion that Raytheon lacked evidence in support of its claims. The tribunal went considerably further in criticizing the company for accusations of bias that "were entirely unfounded" against soldiers assigned to field-test their equipment.

That condemnation was augmented by a financial knuckle-rap of $4,700 to pay tribunal costs.