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Using outcomes-based RFPs to modernize IT infrastructure faster

Zain Ahmed is regional vice president for Lumen’s federal business; Walter Maikish is vice president for Federal Civilian business at Cisco.

Walter Maikish, VP, Federal Civilian Business, Cisco and Zain Ahmed, Regional VP, Federal Business, Lumen

The pandemic and almost overnight massive shift to telework forced federal agencies and IT leaders to make their digital services more accessible to their employees and constituents. They rallied, met their mission and discovered that the need to modernize their IT infrastructure and get the most from cloud-based solutions had become more important than ever before.

Fortunately, the General Services Administration’s Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) contract gives agencies a once-in-a-generation opportunity to modernize as they see fit. EIS and the Alliant 2 Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) provide not only a path to migrate away from aging telecommunication systems to today’s technologies, but also paved the way for building a more modern, flexible and cost-effective IT and communications environment overall.

However, some agencies are still missing a critical opportunity to capitalize on EIS’s potential.

It’s probably not surprising that the demands of the pandemic delayed the work of agencies moving their IT services to EIS. But we didn’t expect to see so many requests for proposals (RFP) focused on replacing “like-for-like” IT infrastructure instead of seeking a more holistic review of their infrastructure centered on improved efficiency and effectiveness. As a result, many of these RFPs left little room to consult with industry providers on all the technology options that are available in the market, what these technologies can now do today and how they can lower overall costs.

What these RFPs also tend to miss is an even bigger opportunity to envision IT infrastructure from an outcomes-based perspective focused on big picture modernization strategies. At the end of the day, the goal is to bring greater agility, efficiency, security and long-term cost savings to agencies’ ability to meet their mission.

Focusing on outcomes rather than technology

We are seeing some great examples of agencies seeking to really modernize their IT infrastructure at agencies such as Veterans Affairs and the U.S. Geological Survey, for example.

When a large, cabinet-level agency decided to update their IT infrastructure, for instance, they prioritized objectives in their RFP that outlined outcomes for their mission, rather than prescribing specific hardware or technologies to acquire.

That holistic approach created an opening for Cisco and Lumen to bring our combined expertise to the table and reimagine the large, cabinet-level agency’s network in a way that brings significantly more value to how they work than would have been possible with a like-for-like update of the older telecommunications systems acquired under the previous Networx contract.

Using the outcomes-based approach, we were able to propose an SD-WAN roadmap that provides more robust automation, network orchestration and secure capabilities than most existing networks. These modern solutions can help ensure that applications perform faster and make digital interactions more secure, especially with data being stored at the edge of the network for quicker access in places such as national parks. And even though this large, cabinet-level agency operates in many remote locations, our solution provided substantial network upgrades to those locations and to their users and visitors who previously didn’t have access to reliable internet access.

The Department of Veterans Affairs, similarly, took a more forward-looking approach to modernizing its infrastructure and broadband capacity, and as a result, was able to dramatically scale up its use of tele-health services for the benefit of veterans as well as its medical teams.

The promise of outcomes-driven RFPs

As agency leaders consider the rapid evolution of technology, it’s easier than ever before to see additional benefits arising from an outcome-driven approach.

For example, when an industry partner promises to deliver on mission outcomes, rather than simply deliver a requested technology platform, the agency benefits from being able to transfer a certain amount of risk to their partner. That in turn incentivizes that partner to recommend technologies that are in the agency’s best interest long term.

It’s from that perspective that we recommend agency leaders consider re-evaluating how they frame their RFPs, starting with:

And finally, it is important to remember that RFPs are just one milestone in an ongoing IT modernization journey. So don’t stop there. Keep your foot on the accelerator in modernizing your IT infrastructure and look for ways to support continual improvements that serve the agency, serve the citizen and serve stakeholders.

Learn more about what your agency needs to get up to speed on EIS, Alliant 2 and other contract vehicles that enable IT modernization and how Lumen and Cisco can help you get there.

White House seeks input on designing a National AI Research Resource

The White House wants public input on how to design a National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR), according to a request for information (RFI) made Friday.

Both the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Science Foundation issued the RFI on what a NAIRR roadmap should look like, the capabilities and services the resource should provide, and how it can foster development of trustworthy AI.

OSTP and NSF announced the NAIRR Task Force — consisting of government, academia and industry members — in June, and it’s expected to report on how it would establish a shared advanced computing and data infrastructure resource for AI researchers by November 2022.

“The goal for such a national resource is to democratize access to the cyberinfrastructure that fuels AI research and development, enabling all of America’s diverse AI researchers to fully participate in exploring innovative ideas for advancing AI, including communities, institutions, and regions that have been traditionally underserved — especially with regard to AI research and related education opportunities,” reads the RFI.

The request also asks responders to identify existing activities, resources and services NAIRR could use; the role public-private partnerships should play in its development; and potential hurdles the resource could face.

The roadmap the NAIRR Task Force creates will recommend goals and metrics for the resource, agencies to manage and oversee it, capabilities it should offer, solutions to hurdles, security and privacy requirements, and funding and partnerships.

Responders have until Sept. 1, 2021, to submit their comments.

Anduril scores $99M contract with DIU for counter-drone tech

The Department of Defense has awarded technology startup Anduril a $99 million contract to provide a new automated counter-unmanned aerial system (C-UAS) capability.

The Production Other Transaction (P-OT) Agreement was struck between the company and the Defense Innovation Unit, the DOD’s Silicon Valley outpost that uses non-traditional contracts to work with start ups. The agreement acts as a vehicle for any of the military branches to purchase the technology and services of Anduril to detect and deter against enemy drones using artificial intelligence. The agreement runs for five years and has the flexibility to allow Anduril to update its services and tech as threats change and software improves.

“This milestone for Anduril and DIU demonstrates that by running meritocratic test events and competitions that focus on capabilities, and rewarding the best systems, DOD can bring the country’s engineering resources to bear on critical national security issues,” Anduril Co-Founder and CEO Brian Schimpf said in a statement.

The tech itself is based on an AI-enabled system that takes in data from an array of sensors to detect incoming drones. Small unmanned aerial systems (UAS) have proven difficult for older detection systems to detect because they are nimble and small. They have also proven to be a nuisance for both military and civilian operations, with non-state groups strapping explosives to commercial drones and commercial flights being grounded by drones near airports.

The deal represents a major milestone for both Anduril and other companies in the emerging markets of defense tech startups. The company’s Chief Revenue Officer Matt Steckman said it was an example of the company bridging the “valley of death,” or the gap in between small research grants that can be earned quickly from the DOD and major multi-million dollar contracts that can take years to pay out.

“This is a meaningful contract to the high tech start up community,” he said in an interview with FedScoop, adding later that “I am actually particularly excited and motivated not by this contact but the change in attitude.”

Attitudes towards contracting within the DOD are criticized by some as being risk-adverse and overly prescriptive. Steckman said also that DIU’s approach could be a model for the rest of the DOD to follow by making contract vehicles that allow for constant iteration.

DIU contracts with tech company by posting problem statements rather than the typical long requirement documents. That approach was one of the many things Steckman said was critical in having a flexible vehicle that will be able to support rapid changes as needed to the system.

TMF funding could help clear NARA veterans’ records backlog, lawmakers say

House lawmakers have written to the National Archives and Records Administration, calling on it to apply for funding from the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) to help clear a backlog of more than 500,000 requests for service records from veterans.

In a letter sent Monday, members of the three House committees said NARA should seek to use the TMF, in addition to existing allotted funds, to speed up IT modernization and digitize records and clear the impasse.

Signatories include Rep. Carolyn Maloney, chairwoman of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, D-N.Y., and Rep. Glenn Grothman, R-Wisc., who is a ranking member on the committee’s National Security Subcommittee.

“NARA has identified the need to digitize records as one of the biggest hurdles to addressing the backlog of veterans’ requests,” the lawmakers wrote in the missive. “Congress has provided substantial financial support for NARA to reach this goal. Although NARA has taken some steps to begin digitization, more significant action is needed to improve the agency’s IT infrastructure.”

Since implementing workplace restrictions at the start of the coronavirus crisis last year, NARA has been unable to process thousands of requests for veterans’ records. The delays have left veterans unable to access certain military records held at the National Personnel Records Center needed to receive service-related benefits, including medical treatment, unemployment assistance, home loans and student loans.

Despite receiving fresh funding, including through the American Rescue Plan Act in March this year, NARA projects that at the current rate, the records backlog will not be resolved until the end of fiscal 2022.

At a briefing on June 9, NARA reported to members of Congress that the backlog stood at nearly 500,000 unprocessed pending requests for records, a number that remained unchanged from May.

Alongside $272 million in funding for NARA included in the American Rescue Plan, Congress in March 2020 provided the agency’s Federal Records Center Program with $8.1 million in CARES Act funding. These funds followed $50 million in emergency appropriations included in the Consolidated Appropriations Act last year.

The latest missive follows a bipartisan letter sent by lawmakers in May, which urged the Department of Defense to help address the backlog of veterans’ records and called on Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to address the data pile-up.

HHS renews, expands Palantir’s Tiberius contract to $31M

The Department of Health and Human Services renewed and expanded its one-year contract for its COVID-19 vaccine distribution platform Tiberius from nearly $17 million to $31 million, tech company Palantir announced Monday.

Palantir Foundry powers Tiberius, which has grown from simply helping HHS understand vaccine distribution across the U.S. and providing an integrated view of the supply chain to serving as the backbone of day-to-day dosage programs launched by agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority.

HHS had Palantir develop Tiberius in mid-2020 as part of the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed, which has since been rebranded as the Countermeasure Acceleration Group.

“We are proud to have supported HHS in administering one of the most successful and rapid
vaccine rollouts in the world,” said Akash Jain, president of Palantir’s U.S. government arm, in an announcement. “As new variants emerge and pose a renewed risk to public health in the United States and around the world, we are humbled to have earned the confidence of HHS once again to help support its lifesaving work.”

Agencies will use the expanded Tiberius platform to weigh policy decisions concerning additional doses and boosters and international distribution, a Palantir spokesperson told FedScoop.

Tiberius already has between 2,000 and 3,000 users including those at HHS, CDC, BARDA, the Countermeasure Acceleration Group, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Pentagon, and other agencies involved in pandemic response. State and territory employees make up two-thirds of the user base, which also includes sub-state entities that receive vaccines like New York City and Chicago and commercial users including all retail pharmacies.

The Long-Term Care Facility and Federal Retail Pharmacy programs hadn’t been envisioned at the start of Palantir’s first contract for Tiberius, which now provides more granular analysis of gaps in vaccine access.

“You sort of see us shifting gears right now from a flooding-the-zone approach to vaccines, where you’re just trying to get as much supply as you can access out there,” the spokesperson said. “And things have really turned a corner where you’re more demand-constrained than you are supply-constrained.”

Embracing a multi-cloud mindset

Although public sector organizations have been moving toward a multi-cloud operating model for some time, the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the trend and forced new discussions around transformational cloud strategies. Today, several public sector agencies are seeing tangible benefits in terms of continuity, resiliency, management efficiency, and security.

“Multi-cloud is not a product or a vendor or a location, it’s a mindset,” said Matt VanSickle, Chief Technology Officer for the State of Montana, speaking at the 2021 Public Sector Innovation Summit sponsored by VMware. “And that mindset really starts with automation and security. And from there, you build on that mindset to deliver those services to the organizations you support.”

VanSickle was responding to Ranil Dassanayaka, Vice President of Architecture & Engineering, GEH, at VMware, who asked public sector leaders in one of the summit’s panel discussions how they are approaching the multi-cloud world. (Watch the full panel discussion here.)

Christine Finnelle, CTO at the U.S. Marshals Service, said her agency is on track to be a 100% multi-cloud agency within the next two years. “We’re almost…50-to-60% cloud-enabled already. And it’s a mix of IaaS and SaaS-type services that provide us a base for those multi-cloud, connections and services to be delivered,” said Finnelle.

The increase in FedRAMP offerings has made it much easier for the U.S. Marshals Service to adopt multiple cloud services while reducing operational overhead, Finnelle said. And while the agency still has some legacy applications that require modernization, the bulk of the effort has been what Finnelle calls a “lift and shift” approach, which not only provides ease of migration to the cloud in a multi-cloud world, but also provides the increased capabilities and security protections that the cloud offers at no additional cost to the base services.

Gary Washington, Chief Information Officer at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, who also spoke at the summit, said the USDA’s multi-cloud approach is based on the federal government’s Cloud Smart strategy.

“Our multi-cloud strategy continues to grow and mature,” Washington said. Today, 81% of the agency’s applications are in the cloud. Given the large number of missions USDA has, “we’re not really dedicated to one single cloud provider or technology,” he said.

“Our approach is to enable our mission and our multi-cloud approach,” Washington said. “We’ve been on this journey for the last for more than four years now. And we have seen tremendous benefits from taking this approach.”

Balancing innovation with security and compliance

Just as the addition of new FedRAMP offerings has streamlined the U.S. Marshals Service’s ability to deploy new cloud offerings quickly and securely, the federal government’s standardized approach to security and risk assessment for cloud technologies is having a positive impact on the state and local level.

“What we’ve done is focus on pre-vetted vendors, focusing on FedRAMP vendors already having that [secure] ecosystem set up,” said Montana’s CTO Matt VanSyckle. “And so when a business user comes to us with a design plan, we can immediately respond based on that pre-vetted idea.”

Another improvement has been the increase in the number of cloud tools available at FedRAMP High — the strongest FedRAMP security control baseline. “FedRAMP High status is important to us,” said Finnelle. “There are some very cutting edge, cross-cloud tool sets that are FedRAMP certified, and those that we’ve used on-prem now are adapted to the cloud models. And so the vendors that have done that are the ones that we adopt so we have that visibility and transparency.”

However, even with pre-vetted vendors from the FedRAMP program, VanSyckle advises his public sector colleagues to test their response plan to different security issues that may come up in any cloud environment. “That’s been the key to supporting that balance of innovation and security,” he said.

Best practices and lessons learned

Although multi-cloud environments are becoming easier to establish — and generating increasing benefits — all three public sector experts agreed that one size does not fit all.

The need to adjust approaches “applies whether we’re talking about legacy apps or migrating to a SaaS platform, or refactoring it within a commercial landing zone and using commercial tools to manage it. We believe each application has a unique customer interface and experience set,” said USDA’s Washington. “And as we go down this journey, we try to be more thoughtful about [how we] engineer applications in the cloud so that they will provide business value, and also minimize the costs that we have.”

VanSyckle advises his counterparts to have an agile mindset and a Plan B. “If you’re going to go into a certain product, or a certain vendor or a certain cloud…have a plan if you need to transition out and have that written down,” he said. “So planning the agile mindset upfront helps across the board and in multi-cloud environments.”

What’s Next?

The future of multi-cloud environments in the public sector hinges on scalability, flexibility, and security. Agencies want to be able to spin up services, servers, storage, and tools leveraging a multi-cloud plane of operations.

“Now with the cloud, there’s that option for the advancement and expansion to things we haven’t even thought of yet,” said Finnelle. “We don’t want to have a proprietary back-end OS in one cloud and another one in another cloud and not be able to talk or create multiple data lakes. We want something that’s federated, something that’s seamless.”

Learn more about the “Multi-Cloud” strategies and how VMware is helping to accelerate public sector innovation.

Deloitte acquires military cybersecurity firm Sentek

Deloitte has bought San Diego-based cybersecurity and systems engineering firm Sentek for an undisclosed sum.

The acquired company provides services to the defense, security and justice sector, and the Navy is one of its largest clients.

Mike Canning, head of Deloitte’s public services division, said the deal would expand the consultancy’s presence in San Diego and boost its cybersecurity work with branches of the military and other federal agencies.

Eric Basu, CEO and founder of Sentek Global, said: “Sentek Global and Deloitte share many common values, not the least of which is providing high-quality services and solutions for the agencies that serve our country. He added: “We are joining Deloitte to help our government clients solve complex systems engineering and cybersecurity challenges, while also accelerating the scaling of our services for defense, security and justice sector organizations.”

National labs modernization bill introduced in Congress

A bill that would compel the Department of Energy to use appropriated funds to upgrade its national laboratories has been introduced in Congress.

Rep. Bill Foster, D-Ill., earlier this month introduced the draft legislation, which has been referred to the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology. Foster worked as a high-energy physicist and particle designer at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory prior to becoming a member of Congress.

If it passes, the new legislation will require the secretary of Energy to fund deferred maintenance projects at the national labs, as well as modernization projects and critical infrastructure updates.

The Department of Energy operates 17 strategically significant research facilities across the U.S., focused on scientific research across a range of areas, including management of the country’s nuclear weapons stockpile.

In late June, an analogous bill was also introduced in the Senate by two Democrat lawmakers, requiring the DOE to upgrade infrastructure at the national labs.

As part of the annual funding appropriations process, Energy is required to submit to House and Senate committees a list of projects that will receive funding. For fiscal 2022 through 2026, the department is authorized to receive $6.1 billion for maintenance and modernization through the appropriations process.

At least one-sixth of the funding for maintenance made available during each fiscal year must be managed by the Office of Science at the Department of Energy.

Senate NDAA draft includes study of budgeting process, other tech provisions

The Senate draft version of the fiscal 2022 National Defense Authorization Act could be the start of the Department of Defense and Congress rethinking the defense budgeting process, a system that advocates for tech modernization have long said inhibits the DOD’s ability to be agile.

A summary published by the Senate Armed Services Committee includes a provision that would establish a commission to study the planning, programming, budget and execution process that forces acquisition programs to wait years before getting full funding from Congress. The budgeting process was created in the 1950s to ensure proper accounting for major industrial projects like buying tanks, but inhibits the kind of rapid iteration needed when buying software, experts have said.

“The FY22 National Defense Authorization Act will help safeguard the nation, counter a range of evolving threats, and support our troops both on and off the battlefield.”

“[I]t prioritizes programs and policies to strengthen our cyber defenses, improve readiness, and accelerate research and development of advanced technologies that will give our forces strategic advantages,” committee chairman Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., said in a statement.

The bill still has a long way to go before becoming law, including passing both the full Senate and House, but the powerful defense committee often gets many provisions enacted into law.

Other new provisions in the summary include several reports the secretary of defense would be required to submit to Congress, including one on DOD’s contractor compliance regime the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC), new augmented reality headset technology and DOD’s use of commercial autonomous capabilities.

The bill would also match several requests the DOD has for Congress, including increased funding for research and development and “full funding” for U.S. Cyber Command. On top of more money for research and development, it would give new hiring authorities to the DOD to retain technical talent in labs. The bill would also create a “civilian cybersecurity reserve” within Cyber Command.

Ex-HHS modernization adviser JD Walter joins Golden Key Group

Professional services consultancy firm Golden Key Group has appointed JD Walter as Executive Vice President of Solution Optimization and Execution.

Previously he was a modernization advisor at the Department of Health and Human Services, and also has several decades of experience as a federal contractor working with various federal departments.

Walter is the latest former government technology leader to join the HR consultancy, after Jessica Salmoiraghi earlier this year moved to the company as a vice president. Salmoiraghi was previously chief acquisition officer at the General Services Administration, a role that she vacated in January.

Commenting on the appointment, GKG CEO and founder Gretchen McCracken said: “Throughout his career, JD has established himself as a government shared services expert with a focus on modernization activities that optimize government efficiency. Those skills are invaluable in our line of work.”