Chase Levinson, program lead for robotics process automation (RPA) in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Financial Management and Control, said the technology worked to accelerate the Standard Operations Maintenance Research and Development System (SOMARDS) retirement process, Nextgov reported Thursday.

He told attendees at a digital event Wednesday his team helped the service branch divest SOMARDS faster using an automated approach. The Army aimed to transfer information from the legacy financial management system into the web-based General Fund Enterprise Business System during the government's 2021 fiscal year.

“[RPA] enables us to pay down our technical debt, to divest from legacy systems and provide the new capabilities where it would otherwise be very difficult to affect those changes,” Levinson was quoted as saying.

He added that automation technology has the potential to drive the adoption of tools that could affect system changes and help enterprises manage operational efficiency.

The U.S. Army has commenced a competition that challenges U.S.-based organizations to present technologies, which address various needs faced by the service branch.

The Army Strategic Rapid Acquisition (AStRA) challenge will assess technologies in the areas of cross-domain solutions, tactical edge processing, novel batteries, multifunction antennas and cyber-electromagnetic operations, the Army said Wednesday.

The competition, which has a total prize pool of $25 million, will run across four phases: concept white paper, oral proposal, request for project proposal, and basis for the award. The first phase ended on May 25 and the second phase will occur in late June.

The Army may award one or multiple other transaction agreements to succeeding entrants.

The service's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) sponsors the competition, which runs under the leadership of the xTech Program. The assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology launched the xTech program to manage the Army's prize competitions that drive technological innovation.

“This will be RCCTO’s third technology outreach event to industry, resulting in many ongoing rapid prototyping efforts,” said Rob Monto, deputy director for advanced concepts and experimentation at RCCTO.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will use an existing document and input from stakeholders to develop best practices in response to an executive order on cybersecurity, Nextgov reported Wednesday.

Executive Order 14028 tasks NIST to inform how the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) would guide federal software procurements.

The Biden Administration issued the order in response to breaches that stemmed from a cyber attack against information technology company SolarWinds, which provides services to the U.S. government.

NIST asked stakeholders for input on software development best practices and hosted a workshop to foster discussion on the topic. The agency will apply gathered input to further build on an existing white paper published in April.

"We are going to try to leverage and expand where appropriate the NIST secure software development framework, which has strong relationships and pointers and leverages many of the great existing industry practices in secure software development,” Kevin Stine, who leads NIST’s applied cybersecurity division, said at the workshop.

Colin Kahl, undersecretary of defense for policy, said the military must address China in an integrated, collaborative way that supports U.S. interests and security, DOD News reported Wednesday.

He said the U.S. would have a more competitive relationship with China, which challenges the U.S. across economic, political, technological and military aspects. 

Kahl noted that handling relations with China will require a holistic response that also involves the participation of non-defense agencies and international partners.

“We need to play to our strengths, which is an unrivaled network of partners and allies around the world,” he stated.

The undersecretary also emphasized that DOD must be ready to deal with disruptive world threats, citing the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change as examples.

Dave Zvenyach, director of the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Technology Transformation Services (TTS) organization, said the agency is looking to modernize Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) processes with automation technology.

Zvenyach noted that FedRAMP, which set a standardized assessment and certification approach for cloud offerings, generates nonlinear costs as the agency onboards more providers into the program.

Zvenyach added that automating the cloud security authorization process will serve as one way to drive the reuse of authorized cloud products.

In Dec. 2019, the FedRAMP management office reached a milestone with the development of an Open Security Controls Assessment Language (OSCAL) in collaboration with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and industry partners.

The OSCAL standard is designed to automatically publish, implement and assess security controls.