Major USAID for-profit development partner faces 88% loss due to cuts

Development Alternatives Inc., a Maryland-based international development firm that was USAID’s second-largest contract recipient last year, has lost 88% of its projected revenue for 2025 due to U.S. President Donald Trump’s demolition of U.S. foreign assistance programs. Since Trump’s inauguration, DAI has received termination notices for 85 of its 91 prime contracts, according to a recent legal filing in a court case USAID implementers have brought against Trump and members of his administration. The award terminations have “seriously damaged the company’s financial performance,” the filing reads. The damages included in the amended complaint, which was filed in late April on behalf of eight different plaintiffs, described a U.S. aid industry facing total collapse. In addition to the well-documented layoffs and furloughs that have rippled through the development sector since the Trump administration shut down nearly all USAID programs, the complaint documents a series of cascading crises. Banks have begun cutting off financing because they “no longer believe that the U.S. government will meet its financial obligations and pay in a timely manner for valid invoices or settlement agreements on U.S. government contracts.” USAID’s implementing partners are defaulting on payments to vendors, landlords, and security providers, causing reputational damage, jeopardizing their legal standing, and in some cases subjecting staff to threats or intimidation. DAI, which has furloughed or terminated more than 3,000 employees, has also seen tens of millions of dollars of equity value wiped out from the retirement accounts of more than 500 employee-owners. In 2024, the company generated over $462 million in revenue. The award terminations have ended funding for programs that provided “shelter for minors seeking protection from recruitment into criminal gangs in Central America,” safe drinking water in Lebanon, civil society in Myanmar, and zoonotic disease detection in Bangladesh, among others, the complaint states.