Gen. Paul Nakasone Outlines Priorities to Boost Cyberspace Posture
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Gen. Paul Nakasone Outlines Priorities to Boost Cyberspace Posture

Gen. Paul Nakasone, commander of U.S. Cyber Command and a seven-time Wash100 awardee, has outlined his priorities for the command to enhance warfighting advantage in cyberspace.

The commander’s focus areas center on building a mission-ready workforce; enhancing partnerships with combatant commands, government agencies and industry; and exercising the command’s full range of authorities to support national security missions, CYBERCOM said Thursday.

Nakasone is attempting to build a future workforce through readiness, resilience and mission improvement and work in unison with the National Security Agency to remain agile and ready in cyberspace.

His priorities are aligned with the National Defense Strategy and support the command’s mission to coordinate and synchronize its cyberspace planning and operations.

CYBERCOM also updated its Challenge Problem Set for 2023, which presents six categories, each capturing specific skill sets and expertise to align with external commercial and academic research and development efforts.

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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy Optimistic on Debt Ceiling Agreement
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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy Optimistic on Debt Ceiling Agreement

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Congress could vote on a measure to raise the debt limit as early as next week, the Financial Times reported Thursday.

“We’re not there, we haven’t agreed to anything yet. But I see the path that we can come to an agreement,” McCarthy told reporters Thursday.

“I think we have a structure now and everybody’s working hard. I mean we’re working two or three times a day, then going back getting more numbers,” he added.

McCarthy’s remarks come as the White House and House Republicans enter into further discussions in hopes of reaching a compromise on the debt ceiling.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen sent a letter to congressional leaders on Monday warning that her department could default on its obligations if Congress fails to increase or suspend the borrowing limit as early as June 1.

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DOD Deputy CIO David McKeown: Private Sector Instrumental in Zero Trust Strategy Progress
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DOD Deputy CIO David McKeown: Private Sector Instrumental in Zero Trust Strategy Progress

David McKeown, deputy chief information officer and senior information security officer of the Department of Defense, said that the agency is on course for a smooth rollout of its zero trust cybersecurity framework by 2027, DOD News reported Thursday.

McKeown, a 2023 Wash100 Award winner, noted that they have been forming “great relationships” with the private sector to implement the zero trust strategy.

Randy Resnick, director of the Zero Trust Portfolio Management Office, is leading the execution of the framework, McKeown said. The agency’s strategy identifies perimeterless security enablement, information systems defense and protection, technology acceleration and cultural adoption as its four main goals.

“We’ve been partnering very heavily with commercial cloud providers, asking them to analyze their offerings, partner with other service provers to try to achieve those 91 capabilities to get us to the target of zero trust,” the deputy CIO explained at a recent event held in Washington, D.C.

Resnick and McKeown will be speaking at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2023 Cyber Summit on June 8. Registration is open for the event, which will take place in McLean, Virginia.

POC - 2023 Cyber Summit
Air Force Plans to Award Contract for Next-Gen Air Dominance System; Frank Kendall Quoted
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Air Force Plans to Award Contract for Next-Gen Air Dominance System; Frank Kendall Quoted

The U.S. Air Force is planning to award a contract covering engineering and manufacturing development activities for its Next Generation Air Dominance platform in 2024.

The service branch said Thursday it has released a classified solicitation to select a contractor to develop the next-generation fighter platform that will replace its fleet of F-22 Raptor aircraft.

“The NGAD Platform is a vital element of the Air Dominance family of systems which represents a generational leap in technology over the F-22, which it will replace,” said Frank Kendall, secretary of the Air Force and a 2023 Wash100 awardee.

Technical and programmatic details on the program remain classified to maintain operational and technological advantages, but the Air Force noted that the solicitation outlines the program’s expected requirements.

The solicitation does not cover the Air Force’s collaborative combat aircraft initiative.

NGAD is expected to perform counter-air missions and be able to strike ground-based and airborne threats.

In June 2022, Kendall said he envisions NGAD and its associated systems to be ready by the end of the decade.

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Nazzic Keene to Retire as SAIC CEO & Pass Torch to Toni Townes-Whitley
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Nazzic Keene to Retire as SAIC CEO & Pass Torch to Toni Townes-Whitley

Nazzic Keene will retire from her role as CEO of SAIC and as a member of its board of directors, effective October 2.

She will be succeeded by global technology veteran Toni Townes-Whitley, who will serve as CEO-elect beginning on June 12 before fully transitioning into the role upon Keene’s departure from the position, SAIC announced from its Reston, Virginia headquarters on Thursday.

“I have known, respected and admired Toni for years and am thrilled to welcome her to our SAIC family,” said Keene.

“I am proud of all we have accomplished for our customers and colleagues during my tenure at SAIC, and I am excited to work alongside Toni in the coming months to ensure we don’t miss a beat in driving sustained growth and performance,” she added.

To ensure Townes-Whitley’s smooth transition into the position, Keene will become the former’s special executive advisor, a role she will hold from the time of the transition through February 2, 2024.

Since joining SAIC in 2012, Keene has attuned the company’s portfolio to the evolving needs of its customers, as demonstrated by SAIC’s generation of approximately 30 percent of revenue from its Growth and Technology Accelerants.

With Keene at the helm, SAIC has dramatically advanced its diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, resulting in a 21 percent increase of people of color within the company’s leadership. She has also driven the organization’s philanthropy work and has received a number of recognitions, including six Wash100 Awards.

Donna Morea, chair of SAIC’s board of directors, expressed her gratitude for Keene’s “tremendous contributions and dedication to SAIC,” which she said increased opportunities for employees, strengthened customer outcomes and boosted value for shareholders.

“The Board’s selection of her successor is the result of a thorough and thoughtful CEO succession planning process to identify the right leader to accelerate the momentum built over the four years of Nazzic’s leadership,” said Morea.

Townes-Whitley brings 35 years of experience in global technology as well as a wealth of experience as a board member for numerous large organizations to SAIC. She has worked extensively on diversity and inclusion initiatives and civic engagement, and has won a multitude of awards for her leadership. Previously, Townes-Whitley served as president of U.S. regulated industries at Microsoft.

“I am honored to bring my passion for driving our nation’s digital transformation to this extraordinary company that is positioned at the intersection of mission critical government programs at a time of evolving, multi-dimensional global threats,” said Townes-Whitley.

She listed SAIC’s strong growth trajectory, expanding portfolio, positive financial trends and integrity in serving its customers and expressed her excitement to continue this momentum.

Nazzic Keene to Retire as SAIC CEO & Pass Torch to Toni Townes-Whitley

SAIC is sponsoring the Potomac Officers Club’s 2023 Annual Air Force Summit, an event that will bring together Air Force leaders to discuss the priorities, challenges and successes currently impacting the service branch. To learn more and register to attend the event on June 18, please visit the Potomac Officers Club events page.

GSA, Geotab Launch EV Suitability Assessment Tool to Aid Federal Fleet Electrification
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GSA, Geotab Launch EV Suitability Assessment Tool to Aid Federal Fleet Electrification

A telematics blanket purchase agreement between the General Services Administration and Geotab has yielded the Electric Vehicle Suitability Assessment tool.

The software is designed to help federal agencies’ fleet managers decide which of their vehicles can be replaced with zero-emission EVs, GSA announced Wednesday.

EVSA uses individual vehicle driving pattern data to analyze the range, function, and cost requirements of an agency’s fleet. It performs predictive analytics of the telematics data and demonstrates vehicle electrification options using actual ZEVs from GSA.

The tool is part of the Biden administration’s Federal Sustainability Plan to buy only light-duty ZEVs by 2027, and medium- and heavy-duty ZEVs by 2035.

“We recognize that quality data used to make correct decisions is critical to accelerating the transition towards a more sustainable, low carbon future, and we are proud to partner with the GSA to bring our EVSA solution to federal fleets,” Geotab CEO Neil Cawse said.

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DOE to Fund National Laboratory-Led Clean Energy Tech R&D Projects
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DOE to Fund National Laboratory-Led Clean Energy Tech R&D Projects

The Department of Energy will finance national laboratory projects focused on the development of commercially viable clean energy and decarbonization technologies.

According to the 2023 Technology Commercialization Fund Base Annual Appropriations National Laboratory Call released Wednesday, efforts should focus on five research areas working to reduce embodied energy and carbon emissions from materials, buildings and industrial processes.

The research priorities include the development of eco-friendly building materials, advanced systems for energy-efficient buildings, thermal energy storage and waste heat recovery technologies, advanced heat pump components and national lab technology projects that use the lab embedded entrepreneurship program.

TCF is an initiative that DOE and national laboratories collaboratively push to support the commercialization of federally funded research and development investments in technologies.

DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy and Office of Technology Transitions sponsored the lab call.

An online information session about the lab call will occur next Tuesday, while project proposals from interested laboratories will be accepted until June 30.

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GAO: OSTP Needs to Address Priority Recommendations Related to Interagency Collaboration, Climate Risk Management
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GAO: OSTP Needs to Address Priority Recommendations Related to Interagency Collaboration, Climate Risk Management

The Government Accountability Office identified eight priority open recommendations for the Office of Science and Technology Policy in July 2022 and found that OSTP implemented only one: the adoption of practices that improve and sustain collaboration.

GAO said Wednesday OSTP should address the seven remaining priority recommendations to achieve improvements in government operations.

These recommendations are classified into three areas: strengthening interagency collaboration; managing climate risks; and tracking progress toward national goals.

For the first area, suggested best practices include fully implementing leading activities for collaboration and developing a plan to address data limitations for potentially critical materials.

Under the second area, GAO recommends that OSTP identify the best available climate data for use in infrastructure planning and clarify sources of local assistance for integrating climate-related data and analysis into infrastructure planning.

GAO has three priority recommendations that fall in the third area: addressing characteristics of a national strategy for high-performance computing; preparing annual reports on HPC that assess progress made in implementing the 2020 strategic plan; and identifying information to gather from federal agencies to determine whether the objectives in the National Strategic Plan for Advanced Manufacturing are being met.

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Report: 84% of GEOINT Practitioners Believe AI Tech Adoption Could Accelerate Government Mission Outcomes
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Report: 84% of GEOINT Practitioners Believe AI Tech Adoption Could Accelerate Government Mission Outcomes

A study underwritten by Hitachi Vantara Federal and Rubrik found that 84 percent of geospatial intelligence practitioners in the government and higher education sectors believe organizations could improve mission outcomes through artificial intelligence adoption.

MeriTalk and the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundation collaborated with the two data management companies to survey 100 GEOINT professionals in February about their priorities and anticipated challenges for the next decade.

The report noted GEOINT organizations are looking to prioritize the adoption of AI and other emerging technologies in the next 10 years, even though only 37 percent of the respondents have formalized a strategy to help implement AI.

Overall, 87 percent said they believe GEOINT technology is underutilized in the public sector and fewer than one-third gave an A grade to their organization for supporting key technology initiatives outlined in the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s 2025 Technology Strategy, which recommends incorporating AI, cloud and supercomputing systems into the sector.

Looking forward, 48 percent of respondents are considering investing in data analytics over the next two years as they believe tools that offer data-driven insight will be the most important GEOINT technology development within a decade.

However, survey participants forecast that a skills gap will be the primary challenge in their discipline.

Respondents expect GEOINT to have the most significant advantages for disaster response, health geography, climate change and urban planning initiatives.

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SSC Delivers Final Space Sensor Payload for Japan’s Quasi-Zenith Satellite System
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SSC Delivers Final Space Sensor Payload for Japan’s Quasi-Zenith Satellite System

Space Systems Command has delivered the second and final U.S.-developed space sensor payload scheduled to launch aboard Japan’s geostationary satellites.

SSC said Wednesday the payloads were developed in collaboration with Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratories as part of the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System-Hosted Payload program.

According to the command, the payloads will contribute to the U.S. Space Force’s space domain awareness mission and the Department of Defense’s integrated deterrence strategy in the Indo-Pacific.

The program also supports the commitment of Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, chief of space operations and a 2023 Wash100 awardee, to “Line Of Effort #3: Partner to Win,” which highlights that “space Power is a collaborative endeavor.”

“QZSS-HP is paving the way for our space partnership efforts, as demonstrated by MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory and L3 Harris. Diversity of orbits, ground architectures, data paths, and host satellites is a distinct feature and distinct strength of the future architecture,” said Brig. Gen. Timothy Sejba, program executive officer for space domain awareness and combat power.

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