NASA has decided to reopen the bidding for the $184 million contract aimed at developing and building the first new spacesuits for the United States astronaut corps since the 1980s.

Initially, NASA chose Oceaneering International Inc., best known for providing deep water services and products to the oil and gas industry, but rival bidder Exploration Systems & Technology, Inc. filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office.

NASA announced in a statement that the pending protest litigation is subject to a Government Accountability Office Protective Order. In total, the three-phase $745 million contract called for 109 suits. Exploration Systems & Technology, which filed the protest, is a joint venture between Hamilton Sundstrand and ILC Dover, two companies that have supplied space suits and components to NASA since the 1960s.

The spacesuits will primarily be used in the Constellation Program voyages to the International Space Station and, by 2020, the surface of the moon.

The spacesuit design currently in use was developed in the 1980s and is outdated. NASA's design specifications for the next generation of protective suits include the ability to support a week's worth of moon walks, as well as contingency spacewalk capability and protection against the launch and landing environment, needed in emergency situations such as spacecraft cabin leaks, NASA said.

The Constellation Program is made up of the Ares I and Ares V launch vehicles, the Orion crew capsule, the Earth Departure Stage and the Altair lunar lander. The program builds upon the Agency's previous human spaceflight programs: Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, Space Shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS).