The contract for 10 billion: who will deal with the cloud for the Pentagon
Understand the situation and provide community views on a potential deal.
Photo - Clem Onojeghuo - Unsplash
In 2018, the Pentagon began working on the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure program (JEDI). It provides for the transfer of all data of the organization in a single cloud. This applies even to secret information about weapons systems, as well as data on military personnel and combat operations. For this task allocated 10 billion dollars.
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Cloud tender has become a corporate battleground. At least nine companies have joined . Here are just a few of them: Amazon, Google, Oracle, Microsoft, IBM, SAP and VMware.
Over the past year, many of them were eliminated, as they did not meet the requirements prescribed by the Pentagon. Some did not have access to work with classified information, and some of them focused on highly specialized services. For example, Oracle for databases, and VMware for virtualization.
Google last year independently refused to participate. Their project could conflict with company policy regarding the use of artificial intelligence systems in the military sphere. However, the corporation plans to continue working with authorities in other areas.
The ten billion deal has caused a great deal of resonance. The main claim to the project JEDI is that the data of the central military department of the country will be concentrated at one contractor. Some members of Congress insist that with such volumes of data must be served by several companies at once, and this guarantees greater security.
A similar point of view is shared in IBM with Oracle. Last October, Sam Gordy (Sam Gordy), one of the leaders of IBM, noted that the mono-cloud approach is at odds with the trends of the IT industry, moving towards the hybrid and multi-cloud.
The community has questions about the contract itself. In Oracle, for example, they believe that it was originally compiled with an eye to winning Amazon. The same point of view is shared by the US Congressmen. Last week, Senator Marco Rubio (Marco Rubio) sent a letter to country national security adviser John Bolton with a request to postpone the signing of the contract. He noted that the procedure for selecting a cloud provider was “unfair”.
Oracle even filed a complaint with the US Accounts Chamber. But it did not bring results. Later, company representatives appealed to the court, where they said that decisions made by the state bureaucrats were compromised by a conflict of interest. According to Oracle, two Pentagon employees were offered jobs at AWS during the tender. But last week the judge rejected the claim .
Analysts say that the reason for this behavior of Oracle are potential financial losses. Several contracts of the company with the US Department of Defense were at risk. In any case, representatives of the Pentagon deny violations, and they say that there is no question of revising the current selection results.
Experts point out that Amazon is likely to be the cloud provider chosen by the Pentagon. If only because the company has sent as much as $ 13 million to promote its interests in the government sector - and this is only for 2017. This amount is comparable to that jointly spent by Microsoft and IBM.
Photo - Asael Peña - Unsplash
But it is believed that for Microsoft is not all lost. Last year, the company made a deal to service the cloud structure of the US Intelligence Community. It includes a half dozen national agencies, including the CIA and the NSA.
Also in January of this year, the IT corporation signed a new five-year contract with the US Department of Defense in the amount of $ 1.76 billion. It is believed that the new agreement can outweigh the balance in favor of Microsoft.
What else can you read in our corporate blog:
Photo - Clem Onojeghuo - Unsplash
Background
In 2018, the Pentagon began working on the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure program (JEDI). It provides for the transfer of all data of the organization in a single cloud. This applies even to secret information about weapons systems, as well as data on military personnel and combat operations. For this task allocated 10 billion dollars.
')
Cloud tender has become a corporate battleground. At least nine companies have joined . Here are just a few of them: Amazon, Google, Oracle, Microsoft, IBM, SAP and VMware.
Over the past year, many of them were eliminated, as they did not meet the requirements prescribed by the Pentagon. Some did not have access to work with classified information, and some of them focused on highly specialized services. For example, Oracle for databases, and VMware for virtualization.
Google last year independently refused to participate. Their project could conflict with company policy regarding the use of artificial intelligence systems in the military sphere. However, the corporation plans to continue working with authorities in other areas.
In the race there are only two participants - Microsoft and Amazon. The Pentagon must make its choice before the end of the summer .
Debate of the parties
The ten billion deal has caused a great deal of resonance. The main claim to the project JEDI is that the data of the central military department of the country will be concentrated at one contractor. Some members of Congress insist that with such volumes of data must be served by several companies at once, and this guarantees greater security.
A similar point of view is shared in IBM with Oracle. Last October, Sam Gordy (Sam Gordy), one of the leaders of IBM, noted that the mono-cloud approach is at odds with the trends of the IT industry, moving towards the hybrid and multi-cloud.
But John Gibson (John Gibson), the general manager of the US Department of Defense, noted that such an infrastructure would cost the Pentagon too much. And the JEDI project was designed to centralize the data of five hundred cloud projects ( p.7 ). Now, because of the difference in quality of storage, the speed of access to data suffers. A single cloud will level this problem.
The community has questions about the contract itself. In Oracle, for example, they believe that it was originally compiled with an eye to winning Amazon. The same point of view is shared by the US Congressmen. Last week, Senator Marco Rubio (Marco Rubio) sent a letter to country national security adviser John Bolton with a request to postpone the signing of the contract. He noted that the procedure for selecting a cloud provider was “unfair”.
Oracle even filed a complaint with the US Accounts Chamber. But it did not bring results. Later, company representatives appealed to the court, where they said that decisions made by the state bureaucrats were compromised by a conflict of interest. According to Oracle, two Pentagon employees were offered jobs at AWS during the tender. But last week the judge rejected the claim .
Analysts say that the reason for this behavior of Oracle are potential financial losses. Several contracts of the company with the US Department of Defense were at risk. In any case, representatives of the Pentagon deny violations, and they say that there is no question of revising the current selection results.
Likely outcome
Experts point out that Amazon is likely to be the cloud provider chosen by the Pentagon. If only because the company has sent as much as $ 13 million to promote its interests in the government sector - and this is only for 2017. This amount is comparable to that jointly spent by Microsoft and IBM.
Photo - Asael Peña - Unsplash
But it is believed that for Microsoft is not all lost. Last year, the company made a deal to service the cloud structure of the US Intelligence Community. It includes a half dozen national agencies, including the CIA and the NSA.
Also in January of this year, the IT corporation signed a new five-year contract with the US Department of Defense in the amount of $ 1.76 billion. It is believed that the new agreement can outweigh the balance in favor of Microsoft.
What else can you read in our corporate blog:
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/460279/
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