An air purifier company is asking a San Diego judge to void a $26.8 million county contract awarded to a competitor, arguing the procurement process was flawed and the winning devices cannot meet mandatory performance requirements.
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Medify Air LLC filed the petition in San Diego Superior Court against the County of San Diego, its Department of Purchasing and Contracting, and department Director Allen R. Hunsberger. The company is challenging the county’s decision to award a contract to Oransi LLC for up to 30,000 portable air purifiers intended for residents affected by noxious gases emanating from the Tijuana River.
The purifiers are part of the county’s effort to provide temporary relief to South Bay residents exposed to hydrogen sulfide from the polluted waterway while the United States and Mexico work to address infrastructure failures at a transboundary wastewater treatment facility.
Medify Air, whose bid of approximately $27.1 million ranked second behind Oransi’s $26.8 million offer, argues the county imposed mandatory performance requirements — including a minimum clean air delivery rate and a noise threshold at or below 45 decibels — but never defined how compliance would be measured.
“The county issued a solicitation imposing mandatory performance requirements, yet failed to define how compliance would be measured,” the petition states. “That approach eliminated any objective basis for determining responsiveness and rendered the award decision unsupported by substantial evidence.”
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Medify Air further alleges that independent third-party testing it conducted on the retail equivalent of Oransi’s bid model showed the device could not simultaneously meet both the airflow and noise requirements at any single operating speed — directly contradicting Oransi’s manufacturer-supplied performance claims, which the county accepted without independent verification.
The county filed a procedural opposition, arguing Medify Air failed to properly serve the county with its court filing under California law and that the court therefore lacks jurisdiction to grant the temporary restraining order the company is seeking. The county did not address the merits of the procurement challenge.
Medify Air is asking the court to void the Oransi contract and either award the bid to Medify or order a new bidding process.
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San Diego County declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Attorneys for Medify Air could not be reached for comment.
