Above: the new McMurdo berthing building under construction in November 2024 (photo from Michael Christiansen). By the end of the 2024-25 summer season it had been enclosed, but all other activities for the long-proposed McMurdo development plans have been put on hold. Will the dorm be finished by the time the new contract takes effect? Who knows...
Yes...finally on 2 June 2026 the new Antarctic support contractor for the next 20 years (ulp...I probably won't be around to follow the next rebid) was announced--KBR! But...it's been protested. Jump down for my full coverage!
Note: My coverage of the last contract rebid won by Leidos is here.
After much speculation and delay, the formal official solicitation for the Antarctic support contract rebid...sometimes known as the Antarctic Science and Engineering Support Contract (or Consortium) (ASESC)...was released on 9 May 2025...and can be found here. It's rather basic and general--a few things that it did include are: the proposal submittal dates--Phase 1 (to include basic bidder information, and past experience and performance documentation) originally due on 23 May but the due date has already been extended to 30 May; after this there was to be a down-selection to be announced on 24 June; the remaining bidders are to submit a Phase 2 submittal which is to include a more detailed management approach, key personnel, and pricing information--by 28 July 2025. What was NOT included was a proposed start date (note that the current Leidos ASC contract was originally to expire on 15 March 2025 but on 26 July 2024 it was extended to 30 September 2026. But...the term of the contract was to be 20 years, with a maximum extension limit to 25 years and a maximum cost of $8 billion. The proposed contract is defined as a single-award Indefinite-Delivery Indefinite-Quantity (IDIQ) contract with differing aspects--Firm Fixed Price, Cost Reimbursement (CR), Cost-Plus-Fixed-Fee (CPFF), and Cost-Plus-Award-Fee (CPAF)--aspects presumably to be proposed by the bidders. Additionally there were several sample task work orders that the bidders are to estimate as a part of their proposals.
There was no detail on the extent of specific tasks to be performed (eg how many vehicles are to be maintained, typical power plant staffing, specific extent of science support). Of course, all of these specifics are very much subject to change given the current budget and science funding cuts and uncertainties. [Not part of the contract solicitation but rather relevant--NSF has issued and is continuing to update their page addressing NSF Implementation of Recent Executive Orders.] There was to be no actual physical site visit scheduled...instead there were to be virtual visit opportunities extended to the bidder teams. While NSF has made a technical reference library available to the bidders, it is rather light on detail--as for facilities at present it only references 10-year-old master plans for McMurdo and Palmer (the new Pole master plan is nearly finished (May 2024 draft) and presumably will be added later). It would seem that the bidder teams are to rely in part on more detailed information available elsewhere, as well as previous Antarctic experiences of members of the bidder teams.
One interesting piece of information in the scope of work is that the contractor would operate the www.USAP.gov web portal until its public-facing content is transitioned to NSF.
Solicitation Updates: (note that all updates are available from the original website link).
8 June 2025: On 15 May the deadline for complete Phase 1 proposals was extended by one week to 30 May 2025. Then on 25 and 29 May two amendments were issued to add questions and answers received from offerors and to amend the solicitation mainly to reflect additions and corrections addressed in the questions. And on 4 June Washington Technology published an article "Leidos to let go of $8B Antarctic contract"--this has a stiff paywall...if you can't see it, basically it says that Leidos Chief Growth Officer Jason Albanese stated that the contract does not fit into the company's "NorthStar 2030" strategy. What is that strategy? Digital modernization and cyber; space and maritime; energy infrastructure; highly-customized mission software; and managed health services. There you have it...I guess that the land of penguins doesn't fit into "maritime."
22 July 2025: The deadline for final submittal was still 28 July 2025. Recent updates have included over 180 questions from bidders--most of which are administrative in nature (things like"page count" or "where is this document?"). The bidders list has not been released publicly...so far I only know of four: a joint venture between Parsons and V2X that they've named Polar Science Alliance, KBR, Battelle, and a last-minute joint venture between AECOM and Raytheon (now a division of RTX). Other possible contenders, some posited by this year-old Reddit thread, included KBR, Fluor, and Battelle. I should add that that Reddit thread gives a simple explanation of an IDIQ contract.
30 September 2025: The solicitation inactive date, per the solicitation website. No official indication of future steps.
7 January 2026: The existing Antarctic Support Contract (ASC) with Leidos was extended another year to 30 September 2027 (SAM.gov announcement and and the PDF justification.
Perhaps irrelevant to the next contract, but I must add that there's a new (May 2026) fuelie contractor (presumably a subcontractor to Leidos/ASC): Maytag Aircraft. Here's one of their job postings.
The process to develop the contract solicitation began...in December 2020 when NSF announced the first of what they called a virtual "Industry Day" held on 16 February 2021 (announcement letter). This and later similar events were announced to present an overview of vision, objectives, and planned acquisition activities, as well as to solicit industry feedback on the acquisition process. The "seeking industry feedback" theme continued with later similar events. The references at the bottom of the announcement letter are no longer online; they are sections from the contract awarded in December 2011. Here is the slide deck presented at the session, as well as the list of questions with answers.
Next, in December 2021 NSF issued a Request for Information (RFI) announcing a webinar information session to be held on 12 January 2022 (announcement), before and following which they would be collecting questions from industry. The list of questions and answers was published on 27 January.
Next, in February 2023 issued a notice proposing a consortium (ASESC) (perhaps rather than a contract) to manage the USAP operations per this notional scope of agreement. They did not explicitly request comments, but presumably they received some. In any case, on 25 May 2023 NSF issued an "Instrument-Type Determination" that the forthcoming procurement contract would be a Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) procurement...essentially a bid contract.
The next relevant activities were not were not promulgated through the procurement site (sam.gov) but directly from NSF. The first was an OPP "Office Hour" held on 26 July 2023 (slide deck). Little was discussed about the forthcoming contract solicitation, but rather the trials and tribulations of the forthcoming (2023-24) season. Later in the summer (over 22-29 August 2023) an online design charrette (meeting) was held by Stanley Consultants, NSF, and RPSC personnel to review the South Pole master plan that Stanley folks were developing (agenda at right). 
The next sam.gov announcement came on 18 October 2023 (updated in December). It did several things...issue a contracting strategy and a draft scope of work (and solicit comments about them and the procurement process). Then things were quiet until 26 July 2024 when the Leidos ASC contract was extended from 31 March 2025 to 30 September 2026 as mentioned above.
The draft solicitation was also released on 26 July 2024 (updated in November..it also iterated that no in-person site visits would be conducted--something reiterated in February 2025. Then, a Presolicitation Synopsis" was issued on 31 March. It reiterated many of the announcements mentioned above.
And that brings us up to the formal solicitation announcement described at the top of this page.
Now we know...although whether KBR will even occupy the building behind the above sign is still a mystery. The significant announcements: the official announcement on the SAM.gov website......which makes no mention of the previous solicitation that happened in 2025. That solicitation was declared inactive, but obviously negotiations were going on behind the scenes....and the award notice states that it was the result of a competitive procurement.
The coverage...first, the official 2 June NSF announcement from NSF. And on 3 June KBR put out this press release.
So...what happens next? The KBR contract had a start date of 2 June 2026...presumably to begin transition. But...Battelle protested in late June 22 June Washington Technology article...saying that the award conflicted with the KBR announcement that they would spin off their government contracts (September 2025 KBR press release). (The Washington Techology site has a strict paywall...if you can't see their article, here's an image of it). As for the current winterovers on the ice, they've heard nothing, but I suspect they'll remain employed by their current contractor. Currently this may be resolved by 21 September. I asked a few Palmer winterovers in late June if they'd heard anything of the transition...they said no. and the current contractors still have jobs posted. Of interest perhaps...this REDDIT thread (I'm not a subscriber, just lurking) that suggest that UTMB (and perhaps other subcontractors) are out.
Updated 12 June 2026.
