/
Federal Reserve Eyes FedNow Service Launch in Mid-2023; Lael Brainard Quoted
Published on
Federal Reserve Eyes FedNow Service Launch in Mid-2023; Lael Brainard Quoted

The Federal Reserve Banks plan to roll out an instant payments service between May and July of 2023.

“The FedNow Service will transform the way everyday payments are made throughout the economy, bringing substantial gains to households and businesses through the ability to send instant payments at any time on any day, and the funds being immediately available to recipients to make other payments or manage cash flow efficiently,” Lael Brainard, vice chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, said in a statement published Monday.

Over 120 organizations are taking part in the pilot program of FedNow Service, which is set to transition to the technical testing phase in mid-September.

These organizations include U.S. Bank, Exchange Bank, Alacriti Payments, ECS Fin, Form3 and ModusBox.

Pilot program participants will undergo a certification process and then transition to the production phase upon launch of the service. The Federal Reserve is tapping non-pilot service providers and financial institutions that will serve as early adopters of the FedNow Service.

/
DOE Allocates $70M to Update Earth Model for Supercomputer-Driven Climate Change Research
Published on
DOE Allocates $70M to Update Earth Model for Supercomputer-Driven Climate Change Research

The Energy Department has granted $70 million in funding to seven research projects aimed at updating an ultra-high-resolution representation of Earth that runs on high-performance computing systems and supports climate change studies.

The projects center around DOE’s Energy Exascale Earth System Model, an exascale supercomputer simulation designed to help scientists understand changing weather patterns, the department said Tuesday.

DOE expects E3SM research and development work to advance computer models of ocean circulation in the Atlantic and the Antarctic.

“Being able to understand and predict what is happening in a system as complex as planet Earth is crucial to finding solutions to climate change,” said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm.

Los Alamos National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the University of New Mexico will lead the potential five-year research efforts, with an initial obligated fund of $14 million.

The grant is part of the DOE’s Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing program. A peer review process took place to select the winning projects.

//
DISA 4th Estate Network Optimization Program Office Surveys Users After Migration to DODNet
Published on
DISA 4th Estate Network Optimization Program Office Surveys Users After Migration to DODNet

The 4th Estate Network Optimization Program Office at the Defense Information Systems Agency received an overall satisfaction score of 4.1 out of 5 from nearly 950 users following their migration to the updated information technology network.

In 2021, DISA’s 4ENO program office started moving all 4th Estate agencies within the Department of Defense to DODNet and performed 60 percent of the migration through a virtual private network and the rest on-site, the agency said Tuesday.

“We realize we were taking a huge chance to measure our success by surveying our customers after their migrations, but we really wanted to know how we’re doing and take an opportunity to hear from them … and we’re happy that they’re happy,” said Laura Herbertson, 4ENO program officer and DISA endpoint services and customer support division chief.

DISA said the customers gave the satisfaction score based on several factors, including communications prior to the migration, online resources available to users, migration instructions and support responsiveness.

/
Army Eyes Basic, Advanced Variants of TITAN Intell Ground Station; Maj. Jermaine Wright Quoted
Published on
Army Eyes Basic, Advanced Variants of TITAN Intell Ground Station; Maj. Jermaine Wright Quoted

The U.S. Army is advancing the development of two variants of its tactical ground station designed to provide intelligence support to facilitate long-range precision targeting and improve situational awareness in contested environments, Defense Daily reported Wednesday.

Maj. Jermaine Wright, assistant product manager for the Tactical Intelligence Targeting Access Node, said the service will likely buy six Advanced prototypes of TITAN and five Basic prototypes of the ground station and expects the program to transition to the production phase in fiscal year 2026.

In June, the Army awarded Raytheon Technologies and Palantir Technologies separate contracts to build and integrate TITAN prototypes.

“TITAN Advanced operates on five enclaves. Currently, it will be on an FMTV M1083 [truck] platform. And then the Basic variant, which will we get to in prototype maturation once we get to our preferred vendor post-upselect at the end of this phase, will be on a JLTV platform,” Wright said.

“The TITAN Basic will not have that space direct downlink. The technology is not there as far as antennas and whatnot. So what they will have is space access via the hubspoke network and a redundant communications network architecture to provide that space data,” he added.

Northrop Grumman has built a TITAN Pre-Prototype and Wright said the Army will take the TPP as a “space-ground component kit” for integration with the prototype designs from Raytheon and Palantir to provide the Advanced version a space direct downlink.

//
KBR-NASK JV Lands $4B NASIC Contract for R&D, Technical Intelligence Production; Byron Bright Quoted
Published on
KBR-NASK JV Lands $4B NASIC Contract for R&D, Technical Intelligence Production; Byron Bright Quoted

A mentor-protégé joint-venture between science and technology company KBR and security-focused small business NASK has won a potential $4.8 billion contract from the National Air and Space Intelligence Center for research and development and mechanical upkeep of various systems.

Through the multiple-award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity Scientific and Technical Information Analytic Capability Support contract, Xandar LLC — the joint-venture — will maintain various hardware, software and architectures to support the creation of scientific and technical intelligence, KBR said Thursday.

“Xandar’s broad technical capabilities and strong understanding of the customer’s mission make us the right partner to support NASIC in meeting both the known and unforeseen challenges of the future,” remarked Byron Bright, president of KBR Government Solutions U.S and a three-time Wash100 Award winner.

Byron Bright also stated that the JV will supply NASIC with a team skilled in analytics that is aimed to prepare the organization to clear the coming years of international security hurdles.

Xandar’s intelligence construction and R&D contributions under the contract are positioned to help the U.S. Air Force, Department of Defense and other federal intelligence entities for the next 10 years.

The combined efforts of the Houston, Texas-based KBR and Fairfax, Virginia-headquartered NASK will perform agile and discovery-seeking resource activities that strive to enable technical analysis in the Intelligence Community. Their work intends to take newly workshopped technologies and evolve them into intelligence products while accelerating speed of production for technical analysis output.

Additionally, Xandar will equip NASIC with tools to better experiment with and identify air, space, missile forces and cyber threats so that they are able to conduct full-spectrum, multi-domain missions, seek and acquire weapon systems and ultimately advise on national defense legislation.

“NASIC’s need to counter rapidly evolving threats requires the agility of a small company plus the power and scope of a large company,” commented Peter Zurbach, president of NASK, referring to NASK’s role as the protégé to KBR’s mentor within the JV.

The NASIC NOVASTAR contract follows another contract awarded to a KBR joint-venture in June. BP Exploration awarded SOCAR-KBR a front-end engineering design contract to actualize the Shah Deniz Alpha platform.

//
Former FBI Exec Natnael Habtesion Added as Lumen VP, Deputy Chief Security Officer
Published on
Former FBI Exec Natnael Habtesion Added as Lumen VP, Deputy Chief Security Officer

Telecommunications company Lumen Technologies has appointed experienced cybersecurity executive Natnael Habtesion as vice president and deputy chief security officer.

In his new VP role, Habtesion will be responsible for administering Lumen’s industrial security, security compliance and audit and security risk assurance efforts, training his attention primarily on public sector and enterprise clientele, the Monroe, Louisiana-headquartered company said Wednesday.

The executive will leverage his almost one decade of service at the Federal Bureau of Investigations to preside over Lumen’s relationships with federal government customers, with an eye toward building and maintaining contract compliance. He is expected to help customers determine how to safeguard their architectures through the usage of Lumen products, based on both the company’s internal and external practices.

At Lumen, Habtesion will also generally liaise with the company’s various public sector clients and strengthen bonds.

During his time at the FBI, Habtesion moved up the ranks from a senior advisor overseeing intelligence and operational strategy to an assistant section chief in charge of strategy and large-scale endeavors.

For the last nearly eight years, Habtesion has worked at Discover Financial Services as senior director of cybersecurity. In this position, he spearheaded information security risk management and third-party information security risk management, as well as the business continuity initiative and the incident and crisis management operation.

Habtesion’s skill set includes change management, strategic planning and program management.

His appointment follows a number of changes to the Lumen leadership team this year. In April, Vinod Brahmapuram was named head of security business development for state and local government and education markets. In March, Chris Stansbury was instated as chief financial officer and in February, Quincy Allen, formerly of IBM, was added to the Lumen board of directors.

/
CGI Federal Completes Government Upgrades of ERP Software Ahead of Treasury Mandate; John Owens Quoted
Published on
CGI Federal Completes Government Upgrades of ERP Software Ahead of Treasury Mandate; John Owens Quoted

Information technology company CGI’s federal business is commemorating the achievement of delivering the most recent version of their enterprise resource planning application to a slew of U.S. government agencies.

In the past year alone, CGI Federal has installed the upgraded version of their Momentum platform for almost 20 federal government entities, ensuring compatibility with the recently debuted U.S. Treasury Government-Invoicing architecture, the Fairfax, Virginia-based subsidiary said Wednesday.

John Owens, CGI Federal senior vice president and enterprise solutions group lead, detailed how the upgrading of agencies’ Momentum program is aimed to stay ahead of a federal deadline of October 1. According to Owens, this will allow agencies to remain current on their G-invoicing implementations, as the team at CGI in charge of Momentum “proactively monitors Treasury post-mandate enhancements.”

In its newly updated form, Momentum is designed to assist agencies with activities such as developing and housing interagency agreements, devising orders, tracking performance and dispatching funds, so that they can ultimately complete Treasury-related objectives efficiently.

Over the last three years, the U.S. Treasury has sought CGI Federal’s counsel while creating the criteria and specifications for their G-invoicing mandates. Momentum users enjoy automated processes for G-invoicing such as streamlined terms and conditions, pull only and push/pull order integration models and comprehensive related billing, collecting, payment, adjustment and accrual practices.

The most recent Momentum incarnation additionally deepens a feature allowing for reimbursal transaction management.

In July, CGI Federal won a spot on a contract from the Federal Communications Commission to conduct a broad spectrum of information technology services, including system modernization and cloud migration.

/
Air Force’s T-38 Fleet Undergoes Repair, Inspection & Maintenance Work at JBSA-Randolph
Published on
Air Force’s T-38 Fleet Undergoes Repair, Inspection & Maintenance Work at JBSA-Randolph

The U.S. Air Force’s fleet of T-38 Talon trainer jets will undergo repair, inspection and maintenance at Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph in Texas.

Approximately 190 T-38 aircraft will each receive more than 6,000 hours of localized, depot-level maintenance as part of the Talon Repair Inspections and Maintenance program, the Air Force reported Tuesday.

“The TRIM modification will address aging airframe-related issues to preclude grounding of these aircraft prior to its eventual retirement,” said Bill Mickley, lead program manager for the T-38 airframe integrated product team.

Mickley added that the program will ensure the availability of the training jets for the “necessary pilot training hours until the fleet is replaced by the T-7A Red Hawk, the all-new advanced pilot training system.”

The aircraft will be returned to their home units across the Air Force and the Navy Test Pilot School after the modification work.

T-38 is primarily used by the Air Education and Training Command for joint specialized undergraduate pilot training.

/
DOE Seeks Info on $10.5B Grid Resilience, Innovation Partnership Program; Jennifer Granholm Quoted
Published on
DOE Seeks Info on $10.5B Grid Resilience, Innovation Partnership Program; Jennifer Granholm Quoted

The Department of Energy is seeking public comments on a $10.5 billion funding program aimed at enhancing the resilience and reliability of the U.S. power grid.

DOE said Tuesday it has issued a request for information to gather feedback from states, tribes, communities and other stakeholders on how to refine the funding opportunity announcement that will be released later in 2022.

The Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnership Program will run for five years to enhance the electric grid in support of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

The new Grid Deployment Office will administer the funding across the program’s three focus areas, which are grid resilience, smart grid and grid innovation.

“DOE is moving quickly to upgrade the nation’s power grid in order to provide American households with more reliable and affordable electricity that comes from a more diverse set of clean energy sources,” said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm.

According to the department, the funding opportunity plays a key role in implementing a coordinated grid strategy outlined in the Building a Better Grid Initiative.

//
Air Force Unveils Interim CIO Strategy Outlining Digital Transformation Priorities Through 2028
Published on
Air Force Unveils Interim CIO Strategy Outlining Digital Transformation Priorities Through 2028

The Department of the Air Force has released an interim draft strategy outlining the chief information officer’s digital transformation priorities over the next six years.

The CIO Public Strategy for fiscal year 2023 to 2018 aims to accelerate the adoption of cloud for the warfighter, build a secure and resilient digital environment, develop a unified talent management strategy, enhance IT portfolio management, create core IT and mission-enabling services and operationalize data and artificial intelligence.

The strategy also puts focus on implementing a zero trust architecture to enable the Air Force to protect data across multiple classification levels.

Lauren Knausenberger, CIO of the Air Force and a 2022 Wash100 Award winner, said zero trust will enable the military branch to simplify its warfighting domain, Breaking Defense reported.

“If we can get to the point where we know who you are, that we have our data tagged, that we can get to multi-level security, that we can maybe not have folks like the USAF commander have 22 different networks in five different machines on their desk, [then] we can fight a lot more easily,” Knausenberger said.

1 … 741 742 743 744 745 … 2,620