Triple Canopy Inc. merged three years ago with former rival Academi, which used to be known as Blackwater. Triple Canopy was born out the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and has since earned its stripes protecting State Department embassies and consulates in Baghdad and around the world.

Blackwater, its onetime rival, is best known for establishing a private army of former special forces soldiers during the Iraq War to provide government security. It was founded by ex-Navy SEAL Erik Prince, buddy of Breitbart News czar Steve Bannon and brother of federal Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.

Records show that Triple Canopy’s building-protection contract with the Department of Homeland Security in Northern California covers up to five years. As it turns out, Triple Canopy didn’t actually come in with the lowest bid — and that led to a formal protest by the current contractor, Paragon Systems Inc.

But a recently concluded review by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that Triple Canopy ultimately negotiated changes to its proposal that made it “a better value” than Paragon’s offer, according to a GAO spokesman.

So now there’s been a changing of the guards.