Cloud | The Contracting Education Academy

January 24, 2019 By cs

The fight for a massive Pentagon cloud contract is heating up

Top tech companies are launching a bidding war for a massive Pentagon cloud contract, even as their workforces are pressing them to refuse all military work.

In addition to the protests from employees, the bidding process for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI, contract is bogged down by infighting between traditional defense contractors and the big tech companies that threaten to edge them out of a lucrative business opportunity—and the Department of Defense worries that all of the controversy distracts from its objective of obtaining the same basic cloud computing capabilities already available for consumers, which it says are necessary to better protect soldiers’ lives on the battlefield.

Although DoD says it’s too early to predict the ultimate value of the contract, JEDI is estimated to be worth about $10 billion. The contract will be awarded for a two-year period, with options to renew for five years and then three years after that. The price-tag makes the JEDI contract tempting for even the largest of tech firms. (Google, for instance, announced in February that its cloud business earned more than $1 billion per quarter, while Amazon Web Services nets over $5 billion each quarter.) The company that wins the contract will also have a foot in the door for future Pentagon work, as the DoD looks to rapidly expand its artificial intelligence capabilities.

Keep reading this article at: https://gizmodo.com/the-fight-for-a-massive-pentagon-cloud-contract-is-heat-1825517332/amp

January 4, 2019 By cs

Someone is waging a secret war to undermine the Pentagon’s huge cloud contract

As some of the biggest U.S. technology companies have lined up to bid on the $10 billion contract to create a massive Pentagon cloud computing network, the behind-the-scenes war to win it has turned ugly.

In the past several months, a private investigative firm has been shopping around to Washington reporters a 100-plus-page dossier raising the specter of corruption on the part of senior Defense Department and private company officials in the competition for the JEDI cloud contract. But at least some of the dossier’s conclusions do not stand up to close scrutiny.

The dossier insinuates that a top aide to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis worked with Mattis and others to steer the contracting process to favor Amazon Web Services, or AWS — and enrich the aide. The aim of the dossier seems clear: to prevent the deal from going solely to AWS, the odds-on favorite in part because it operates the CIA’s classified commercial cloud. Far less clear, however, is who backed its creation and distribution.

It’s an unusually hardball form of backroom maneuvering in the world of lucrative but rigidly controlled defense contracting. The firm that prepared the dossier, RosettiStarr, shopped it to various Washington reporters earlier this year. Defense One was given a copy in May. At the time, RossettiStar President and CEO Rich Rosetti declined to reveal who funded the firm’s efforts.

Former defense officials told Defense One they received inquiries about the allegations from the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Reuters, and the Intercept. For months, the accusations went unaired by news outlets, including Defense One and Nextgov, sister publications in Atlantic Media’s Government Executive Media Group.

But in the past few weeks, some of the information in the dossier has surfaced in various publications. Now that the dossier’s targets have been publicly accused, they are speaking out. In exclusive interviews with Defense One and Nextgov, they vehemently deny any wrongdoing and seek to turn the spotlight on their mysterious accusers.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2018/08/someone-waging-secret-war-undermine-pentagons-huge-cloud-contract/150685/

October 11, 2018 By cs

2nd protest filed against Pentagon’s proposed single cloud acquisition

IBM filed a bid protest Wednesday against the Pentagon’s $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure cloud contract.

The pre-award protest, filed with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) on Oct. 10, 2018, comes just two days before the Oct. 12 deadline for the Pentagon to accept bids from cloud service providers. IBM officials told Nextgov they still plan to submit a bid for JEDI, but the company’s protest takes issue with the Defense Department’s decision to award JEDI to a single cloud service provider.

“JEDI’s primary flaw lies in mandating a single cloud environment for up to 10 years,” said Sam Gordy, General Manager for IBM Federal, in a blog post announcing the protest. “Leading global enterprises want clouds that are flexible, provide access to the best applications from multiple vendors, and can smoothly transition legacy systems. JEDI is a complete departure from these best practices.”

Oracle, another JEDI competitor, protested the JEDI solicitation in August on similar grounds. Oracle has subsequently filed a series of amended protests in the months since under legal seal, with a final decision expected from GAO by mid-November.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/10/ibm-files-bid-protest-against-pentagons-jedi-contract/151908/

August 23, 2018 By cs

Someone is waging a secret war to undermine the Pentagon’s huge cloud contract

As some of the biggest U.S. technology companies have lined up to bid on the $10 billion contract to create a massive Pentagon cloud computing network, the behind-the-scenes war to win it has turned ugly.

In the past several months, a private investigative firm has been shopping around to Washington reporters a 100-plus-page dossier raising the specter of corruption on the part of senior Defense Department and private company officials in the cloud contract competition. But at least some of the dossier’s conclusions do not stand up to close scrutiny.

The dossier insinuates that a top aide to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis worked with Mattis and others to steer the contracting process to favor Amazon Web Services, or AWS—and enrich the aide. The aim of the dossier seems clear: to prevent the deal from going solely to AWS, the odds-on favorite in part because it operates the CIA’s classified commercial cloud. Far less clear, however, is who backed its creation and distribution.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/08/someone-waging-secret-war-undermine-pentagons-huge-cloud-contract/150684/

June 29, 2018 By cs

Here’s how not to screw up a $50 billion networking contract

The clock is ticking toward a 2020 deadline for agencies to switch over to the General Services Administration’s massive new contract vehicle for network and telecom services, and federal IT leaders are worried agencies might blow it.

Last year, GSA rolled out the Enterprise Infrastructure Services contract, a $50 billion blanket award that covers governmentwide procurement of traditional networking and telecommunications equipment, as well as a mix of emerging technologies. All agencies are required to transition to EIS by 2020, and the contract could last up to 15 years.

EIS has the potential to streamline innovative tech purchases, boost federal cloud usage and strengthen cybersecurity across the government, top IT officials said at a forum hosted by ACT-IAC, a government and industry organization.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/06/officials-heres-how-not-screw-50-billion-networking-contract/149137/

See GSA’s Enterprise Infrastructure Services fact sheet here: EIS_Fact_Sheet

Top tech companies are launching a bidding war for a massive Pentagon cloud contract, even as their workforces are pressing them to refuse all military work.

As some of the biggest U.S. technology companies have lined up to bid on the $10 billion contract to create a massive Pentagon cloud computing network, the behind-the-scenes war to win it has turned ugly.

IBM filed a bid protest Wednesday against the Pentagon’s $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure cloud contract.

As some of the biggest U.S. technology companies have lined up to bid on the $10 billion contract to create a massive Pentagon cloud computing network, the behind-the-scenes war to win it has turned ugly.

The clock is ticking toward a 2020 deadline for agencies to switch over to the General Services Administration’s massive new contract vehicle for network and telecom services, and federal IT leaders are worried agencies might blow it.

Search this Website