Washington,
D.C. — TechNet, the national,
bipartisan network of innovation economy CEOs and senior executives, welcomes
today’s oral arguments in Palantir USG, Inc. v. U.S. at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. TechNet
filed an amicus brief in June 2017 in support of Palantir’s position. The
brief, which was prepared by the law firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati,
is available here.
The case involves a dispute between the U.S. Army and Palantir about a 1994 law
— the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act (FASA) — which
requires federal agencies to procure commercially available technology.
This commercial item preference was enacted by Congress to prevent
federal government agencies from developing their own technology systems from
scratch when the proven technologies they need already exist.
“The federal
government should be using the most secure state-of-the-art technologies that
have already been rigorously tested and improved, instead of developing their
own unproven and more costly systems from scratch,” said TechNet President and CEO Linda Moore. “The law is clear that the federal government
should not be wasting taxpayer dollars on creating their own technology
products when those products are already commercially available, more secure,
and can be immediately put to use in serving the American people. This case is an opportunity to settle the
matter once and for all.”