The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) this month awarded L-3 Communications [LLL] a $61 million contract for the purchase of 60 additional medium-speed explosives detection systems (EDS) used to screen checked bags at the nation’s airports.
The recent award follows a decision by TSA nearly a year ago to adjust the ceiling value on L-3’s sole-source contract for the medium-speed EDS beyond the $117.2 million awarded to the company in 2009. The 2009 award was designed as an interim-contract by TSA to allow the agency to continue purchasing L-3’s medium-speed EDS systems while it conducted a new competitive procurement for EDS in three categories: Reduced size; medium-speed; and high-speed.
TSA in 2009 also awarded a sole-source contract for medium-speed EDS to General Electric‘s [GE] Homeland Protection business, which has since been sold to a division of France’s Safran Group and renamed Morpho Detection. TSA tells TR2 that the ceiling value on Morpho Detection’s contract has not been adjusted.
The additional L-3 machines that TSA is buying will go to airports that are already using the company’s 6600 eXaminer 3DX EDS, the agency says. The TSA says that no other manufacturer can meet its needs to seamlessly integrate EDS into existing baggage handling systems.
The agency notes that the costs of switching out one manufacturer’s EDS system for another’s are prohibitive. While it costs about $1 million to purchase a new EDS system, installation and switching costs for that system can be as high as $6 million. Contributing to the high switching costs is baggage handling system redesign, reprogramming, removal of existing systems and mechanical components, disposal, equipment movement, additional electrical requirements and operational testing.
The medium-speed EDS make up the vast majority of automated explosives detection scanners that TSA uses to screen checked bags, having purchased over 1,000 of the systems from L-3 and Morpho Detection.
TSA hopes to award contracts this summer under the new competitive EDS procurement that also includes tougher detection standards for finding explosives in baggage. The agency and the Department of Homeland Security’s Transportation Security Laboratory have been testing high-speed designs being supplied by L-3, OSI Systems [OSIS] Rapiscan division and SureScan Corp. for possible certification to the new detection standards but so far none of these systems have been certified.