As commented on at American Thinker here, firearms manufacturer Colt Defense filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection under on June 15 of this year. 

Update:  according to the September 25, 2015 Department of Defense contract announcements:

Colt Defense LLC, West Hartford, Connecticut (15QKN-15-D-0102); and FN America LLC, Columbia, South Carolina (W15QKN-15-D-0072), were awarded a $212,000,000 firm-fixed-price multi-year contract for M4 and M4A1 carbines for the Army and others, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 24, 2020.  Bids were solicited via the Internet with six received.  Funding and work location will be determined with each order. Army Contracting Command, Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey, is the contracting activity.

It’s curious why the two competitors would team up for such a lucrative contract.  This writer learned about the deal from thefirearmblog.com.  One of the comments came from poster named Daniel E. Watters, whose avatar identifies him as a firearms historian.  He wrote:

The military contracting community has been using multiple IDIQ [Indefinite Delivery / Indefinitely Quantity] awards more and more often in an attempt to defuse potential award protests. If Picatinny had just made a single award to say FN, then Colt could keep things tied up by filing an award protest and follow-up appeals.  By signing their contracts, Colt and FN now only have legal grounds to protest if their minimum order is not made, or if their delivery orders ultimately exceed the contract maximum.

That makes sense.  Colt surely has a pile of AR-related patents, and FN captured the last defense contract (traditionally a Colt award).  Colt has probably already filed a slew of lawsuits to recover from its bankruptcy status.  So some genius probably masterminded/coerced this joint contract to circumvent perpetual litigation expenses.

It’s not likely a marriage made in heaven – probably more of a shotgun wedding.

Mike VanOuse is a FactoryJack from Indiana and author of God and You.  He can be reached at reply@vanouse.com.