telecommunication | The Contracting Education Academy

July 29, 2020 By cs

Deadline looms for contractors to ditch banned Chinese equipment

Federal contractors face a late-summer deadline to ensure they’re not using banned Chinese equipment and services to fulfill their federal contracts, a top White House federal acquisition official stressed.

Federal contractors have until Aug. 13 to comply with Part B of Section 889 of the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act, Office of Federal Procurement Policy Administrator Michael Wooten said during a July 13 Professional Services Counsel (PSC) webcast.

That provision prohibits government contractors from using technology and services tied to Chinese equipment manufacturers that have been deemed cybersecurity threats by the U.S. government. Those companies include telecommunications gear-makers Huawei and ZTE, as well as video surveillance manufacturer Hikvision.

The Trump administration has worked to push Huawei and ZTE out of U.S. federal and commercial telecommunications networks, both domestically and internationally, deeming the companies’ close relationships to the Chinese government as a virulent cybersecurity threat.

Keep reading this article at: https://fcw.com/articles/2020/07/13/rockwell-defense-contractors-huawei-ban.aspx

March 28, 2019 By AMK

Security authorizations trickle in as deadlines near on $50 billion telecom contract

Agencies have until September to award task orders off the massive Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions telecommunications contract, but as of last Thursday, only one vendor has met the security requirements to be eligible for award.

The EIS contract is expected to be worth $50 billion over 15 years, as every federal agency — civilian and defense — is preparing to solicit services ranging from basic telecom to video and voice over IP to wholesale infrastructure modernization. As the backbone infrastructure for all data and communications transiting in and out of agency networks, the nine companies with spots on the contract will have to meet stringent cybersecurity standards, documented and verified through an authority to operate, or ATO.

CenturyLink announced last week that it was the first to complete the ATO process.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2019/03/security-authorizations-trickle-deadlines-near-50-billion-telecom-contract/155751/

January 26, 2018 By AMK

Watchdog: GSA assuming ‘unnecessary’ risk in telecom transition

The General Services Administration’s Federal Acquisition Service is engaging in risky business by providing $9 million in contract support services to agencies without securing interagency agreements that ultimately ensure payment.

Such interagency agreements are required by Federal Acquisition Regulation, but FAS provided services anyway in a rush to meet deadlines imposed by the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions transition, according to an audit by the General Services Administration inspector general. Due to expiring contracts, all agencies must start buying telecommunications and network infrastructure from the EIS contract by 2020.

GSA awarded the $50 billion EIS telecommunications contract last year, and through the Transition Ordering Assistance task order, GSA is also responsible for helping agencies transition from the Networx contract to EIS. However, FAS “has not executed interagency agreements with transitioning agencies for services being provided under the TOA task order.”

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/it-modernization/2018/01/watchdog-gsa-assuming-unnecessary-risk-telecom-transition/145201/

March 31, 2014 By AMK

What went wrong with GSA’s Networx transition?

A pair of internal analyses by the General Services Administration finds much to criticize in the structure of federal telecommunications contract Networx, portraying it as too complex, inflexible and mismatched to the way agencies buy telecom services.

The Government Accountability Office has estimated that a protracted agency transition to Networx from the predecessor governmentwide telecommunications contract caused agencies to miss out on $329 million worth of savings and GSA to spend an extra $66.4 million on supporting it. In the end, the transition took three years longer than anticipated.

GSA provided the two reports – one from July 2012, another from September 2012 – after FierceGovernmentIT submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for them. Agency officials decided to release the documents independently of FOIA, and we withdrew the request after being promised the reports.

Among the observations the analyses make is that while GSA initially defined more than 50 telecom services for Networx, only six services account for more than 80 percent of business volume.

“Networx has thousands of contract line items and millions of service permutations,” the July 2012 report says. “It is no surprise that agencies indicate the Networx program is too complex.”

Keep reading this article at: http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/what-went-wrong-networx-transition/2014-03-10

Federal contractors face a late-summer deadline to ensure they’re not using banned Chinese equipment and services to fulfill their federal contracts, a top White House federal acquisition official stressed.

Agencies have until September to award task orders off the massive Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions telecommunications contract, but as of last Thursday, only one vendor has met the security requirements to be eligible for award.

The General Services Administration’s Federal Acquisition Service is engaging in risky business by providing $9 million in contract support services to agencies without securing interagency agreements that ultimately ensure payment.

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