July 10 2023

QUICK HITS

• Federal agencies are on Meta’s Twitter killa Threads, here’s what NARA says about that: Assess business needs and risks, blah blah blah.

• IRS panel urges agency to promote Free File program before advancing its own alternative: Go easy on that beta test, pardners!

• Can we make it easier for small businesses to succeed in GovCon? Let’s be honest: Not everyone has what it takes to be successful.

• Merits, impacts of SBIR, STTR programs: New data shows money ($6.5 billion) is being invested in biotechnology and medical technology.

DEFENSE & AEROSPACE

Space Command argues for shift from static to dynamic satellite operations.

In order to better keep tabs on adversaries, the U.S. military needs satellites that can actively maneuver in orbit. “The way we’ve been doing space operations since the dawn of the space age, we’ve been doing it wrong,” Lt. Gen. John Shaw said. Perhaps not all satellites have to be highly maneuverable, Shaw said. But surveillance and reconnaissance platforms need to be more mobile in order to better monitor adversaries’ activities. Read more.

Hicks to receive brief on first slate of joint tech experiments.

The Pentagon’s chief technology office will soon brief Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks on the first slate of joint projects known as the Rapid Defense Experimentation Reserve (RDER). Hicks observed the ongoing RDER experimentation round during a visit this week to Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Oahu, Hawaii. Read more.

How Marine Commandant Berger became a ‘poster boy for change.’

In Newport, R.I., a weak U.S. force was about to face off against well-armed and advanced Chinese troops. It was 2018, and then-Lt. Gen. David Berger was putting four years of simmering thoughts to the test in a wargame at the Naval War College, hoping to figure out a better way to employ Pacific forces. His last two assignments had put him at the forefront of the Marines’ shift away from ground wars and back to sea. Now he had a chance to see how all these ideas would play out in a fight against an advanced competitor. Read more.

ICYMI Snippets

• Court ruling could overturn federal control of the National Guard.

• Air Force’s largest-ever mobility exercise to prove prowess in Pacific.

• Op-Ed: Establish integration metrics to prioritize ‘glue’ for all-domain operations.

• Commentary: How to think like a software factory.

• Space Systems Command issues Hemisphere draft RFP.

• Coast Guard petitions for formal recognition in US Cyber Command’s force.

Defense Contract Awards

• Leidos to train U.S. Army aviators for HADES program.

• Accenture snags $98M DHA deal to improve medical platform.

• Army live and integrated gaming contract was awarded to 7 lucky contractors.

• Imagine One won a $30M Navy contract for system modernization for the NMMES program.

Follow the Defense Leaders

• Former NASA senior exec joins Booz Allen as executive advisor.

• Atlas Space names a former VP of Real-Time Earth at Viasat as its CEO.

• Scientific Systems hires AF veteran as VP of Biz Develop.

Defense Job Openings

• The Air National Guard is seeking a Program Analyst.

• Army Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command is seeking a General Engineer.

• Army Futures Command is hiring a Supervisory Interdisciplinary.

DAILY FUNNY

INTEL COMMUNITY

RFP: ICE seeks Enterprise transformation support services.

The DHS, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has a need to obtain support services for transforming the agency’s enterprise services through a phased approach that streamlines ICE operations, improves efficiency and effectiveness of customer service deliveries, standardizes ICE processes and procedures, improves access to data to provides a common operating picture, integrates and implements supporting technology solutions, and maximizes use of its personnel resources to avoid duplication of effort. ICE anticipates making an award for this requirement in FY23 with a period of performance for three years and an estimated total budget of $25M. Read more.

Q&A: DOJ CIO Rogers grades out IT strategic plan progress.

With the DOJ IT operations at the midpoint of executing a three-year IT strategic plan, Meri Talk asked agency CIO Melinda Rogers a few weeks back for a run-down on progress with the plan so far, some of the advancements still in progress, and how the five pillars of the strategic plan are making a difference for the operations of DOJ and its 40 or so agency components. One good user experience: determining vaccination rates during the COVID pandemic. Read more.

ICYMI Snippets

• CISA warns against latest Truebot malware variants: Cybersecurity Advisory issued with Canadian Centre for Cybersecurity and FBI.

• NSA is holding a hiring event in Austin, Texas, on Aug. 12.

• The ODNI is hiring a Chief Executive Engagements Group.

• GDIT’s intelligence division won two contracts valued at $580M to provide cybersecurity and software development services.

• Quadrint awarded $275M contract to support NGA systems, applications.

CIVILIAN

Protests circle around Interior’s $1B cloud contract.

SAIC and General Dynamics IT have filed GAO protests over Interior Department’s award of its 11-year, $1B Cloud Solutions III contract to Peraton. The protest are filed on the grounds of misevaluation of proposals and flawed discussions, which they think obviates Interior’s best value award to Peraton. Read more.

NARA: Agencies need to better manage records created on collaboration platforms.

NARA is instructing agencies to incorporate records management practices when it comes to their use of collaboration platforms such as Zoom, Slack, Discord, Google Workspace, and Microsoft 365, among others. NARA said that agencies do not need to record every video conference or capture every chat. According to NARA, agencies should document “substantive conversations” during a video conference just as they would for an in-person meeting. Read more.

GAO: DHS still needs to develop cyberspace workforce plan.

DHS has one of the most difficult cybersecurity missions across the federal government but lacks a workforce plan to ensure the agency can conduct critical cybersecurity workforce reviews. The chemical security workforce is an area of immediate concern, including DHS’s mission to help secure thousands of chemical facilities across the US. Read more.

ICYMI Snippets

• How will NIH resolve the remaining CIO-SP4 protests? Are they prioritizing protests filed with external legal counsel?

• Years later, the Marshals Service is still looking for help with seized crypto.

• US Capitol Police in ‘very early stages’ of body-worn camera pilot.

• FLRA will test out paperless document delivery.

• CDC Event: FY24 - Expiring Contracts & Justification and Budget Estimate Analysis.

• Energy Department sets plan to make more research public.

Civilian Contracts Awards

• Reli Group, Inc. won a $5M CMS OAGM Technical Support Services task.

• Four Points Technology won a $5M VA TAC award for FY23 Visualization and Automation Edge Technologies Software Maintenance and Support task.

• CMS awarded Newwave Telecom and Technologies a $7M Business Operation Support (BOSC) Bridge task.

Follow Civilian Leaders

• More changes might take hold on Mercury's board.

• A former president and CEO of SPA joins A-TEK’s board.

Civilian Job Openings

• OMB is hiring a Branch Chief Financial Management Mission Delivery.

• FEMA is seeking an Administrative Officer.

• The Architect of the Capitol is hiring a Chief Administrative Officer.

• Federal Trade Commission is seeking a Deputy Inspector General.

M&A CORNER

Greystones Group and ASR Analytics announce mentor-protégé JV.

Greystones announced the formation of Misssion-Insights LLC, a mentor-protege joint venture with ASR Analytics, a GCOM company. The new joint venture team will accelerate mission critical artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cognitive solutions for the U.S. civilian and defense markets. Read more.

Plasmos pivots from rocket engines to VC.

Plasmos, the startup developing rocket engines, is pivoting to become an artificial intelligence-driven venture capital firm. Plasmos officially changed its business model in late May after struggling to attract investors and strategic partners due in part to the background of Plasmos CEO Ali Baghchehsara. Born in Iran, Baghchehsara moved to Germany as a teenager to earn a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering. There, he worked for the German Aerospace Center DLR and Airbus, before moving to the United States in 2021 to pursue his dream of developing hybrid electric-chemical rocket engine. Read more.

SHOWER THOUGHTS 🚿

Investors bought nearly $1 Billion in land near a California Air Force Base. Officials want to know who exactly they are.

Government officials are investigating large land acquisitions near a major air force base northeast of San Francisco, concerned that foreign interests could be behind the investment group that purchased the land. At the center of the probes is Flannery Associates, which has spent nearly $1 billion in the last five years to become the largest landowner in California’s Solano County, according to county officials and public records. Read more.

The West learns again that war needs industry.

Behind the deadly front lines where Ukrainian and Russian soldiers are locked in combat, a less-noticed life-or-death battle is raging to keep troops supplied with arms and ammunition. The side that loses that fight is the one that will lose the war. It is a lesson Washington is relearning. Read more.

A new era of high-tech war has begun.

Big wars are tragedies for the people and countries that fight them. They also transform how the world prepares for conflict, with momentous consequences for global security. Britain, France and Germany sent observers to the American civil war to study battles like Gettysburg. The tank duels of the Yom Kippur war in 1973 accelerated the shift of America’s army from the force that lost in Vietnam to the one that thumped Iraq in 1991. That campaign, in turn, led China’s leaders to rebuild the People’s Liberation Army into the formidable force it is today. Read more.

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