The U.S. Department of Defense has requested a 30-day extension before it makes a final decision about its $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure project.

The JEDI project entails building cloud computing infrastructure for the Pentagon that will link together its various military systems under a single, unified architecture. The DOD says JEDI will also enable it to advance various artificial intelligence projects.

Microsoft Corp. was controversially awarded the JEDI contract in October, ahead of a rival bid from Amazon Web Services Inc. But Amazon, which was widely considered to be the favorite to win the contract, responded by suing the federal government, claiming that President Donald Trump’s personal animosity towards the company had impacted the outcome of the contest.

Amazon’s lawsuit has since been put on hold while the DOD reviews various aspects of the two competing bids.

In an update July 30, Pentagon Chief Information Officer Dana Deasy said a decision on the JEDI award was expected to be made by the end of August. But now the DOD is asking for another extension for its remand decision, until Sept. 16, according to court filings made public today. Neither Amazon nor Microsoft are opposed to the motion, it was reported.

“During the remand, DOD has identified areas of concern with respect to the revised proposals received from both offerors, resulting in multiple solicitation amendments, rounds of proposal revisions, and exchanges with the offerors,” the filing states. “In evaluating each offeror’s final proposal revisions, however, DOD has recently identified the need to reopen limited discussions related to certain aspects of the offerors’ pricing proposals.”

According to the filing, both companies will have another chance to submit questions and a revised bid.

“DoD anticipates that the re-evaluation process will be complete by early September,” it states.

Constellation Research Inc. analyst Holger Mueller told SiliconANGLE that the JEDI story was becoming a never-ending saga with yet another delay being announced.

“One can only wonder what the Pentagon is looking at now,” Mueller said. “What is sure is that its requirements for a defense system must have changed, given the lengthy selection process. Of course, that’s a key lesson that enterprises know already, but the government works on a different level.”

Mueller also repeated often-heard criticism of the Pentagon’s decision to award the JEDI contract to a single bigger, saying that it would be much better for everyone concerned if it were to reconsider that stance.

Amazon and Microsoft have been sparring ever since the contract was awarded. In May, Drew Herdener, Amazon’s vice president of worldwide communications, protested the Pentagon’s award of the JEDI contract, saying that the decision was “fatally flawed on all six of the technical evaluation factors.” Frank Shaw, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of communications, responded by accusing Amazon of “trying to bog down JEDI in complaints, litigation and other delays” in order to revive its failed bid.

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