A federal judge declined to issue a preliminary injunction against McLean, Virginia-based Booz Allen Hamilton’s acquisition of Reston-based cybersecurity company EverWatch.
The Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit to block the planned $440 million acquisition in June, saying it would eliminate competition for critical National Security Agency work. Booz Allen and EverWatch are both bidders on an NSA contract for signals intelligence, a surveillance-gathering method for intercepting communications.
Booz Allen is the largest government IT contractor in the D.C. region, and one of the largest employers, with almost 14,000 employees on its D.C.-area payroll. The EverWatch merger would expand its national security work for software development and analytics.
It would also expand its workforce with the highest government security clearances.
EverWatch is a portfolio company of Chevy Chase, Maryland-based investment company Enlightenment Capital. It was founded in 2017.
