The Department of Defense is preparing a new iteration of its $9 billion Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract to enable competition and a faster acquisition process.
Opening the Door to More Cloud Service Providers
At the recent ATO and Cloud Security Summit, DOD Chief Information Officer Katie Arrington, a Wash100 Award recipient, said the upcoming JWCC Next contract will allow smaller and non-traditional cloud service providers to participate. The move will mark a shift from the first JWCC contract, awarded in 2022 to Amazon Web Services, Google, Microsoft and Oracle.
“We are looking to expand the aperture,” Arrington said. “Competition breeds innovation, competition breeds efficiency.” The CIO emphasized that DOD is seeking companies offering innovative AI tools, satellite capabilities and faster methods for developing weapons systems and business tools.
Streamlining the Acquisition Process
Lt. Gen. Robert Skinner, director of the Defense Information Systems Agency and a three-time Wash100 awardee, previously said DOD aims to streamline the contracting process for JWCC Next. “What it’s going to bring is even faster commercial cloud capability, greater diversity where we can hope that we can have even more cloud service providers and potentially have an option of not having task orders competed,” Skinner said.
Under the current JWCC, DOD has already awarded more than 65 task orders worth over $1 billion. Arrington did not provide a timeline for the release of a draft JWCC Next request for proposals but noted it would be “very, very soon.”
JWCC succeeded the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure contract, which was canceled following years of litigation and controversy.
