Transportation awards Google major contract after ‘OneGov’ deal

The Department of Transportation has inked a deal for Google’s Workspace software suite using discounted rates made possible through the company’s April ‘OneGov’ agreement with the General Services Administration.

According to contracting documents obtained by Nextgov/FCW, Transportation awarded the five-year enterprise license agreement on Sept. 27 to deliver Google Workspace across the department via prime contractor Carahsoft.

The contract has a total ceiling value of up to $89 million and will ultimately provide the department — which has more than 50,000 employees across the country — access to Google Workspace’s cloud-native apps like Gmail, Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Meet and more, as well as popular AI tools Gemini and NotebookLM.

Google declined to comment for this story and the Transportation Department was unable to comment due to the government shutdown.

In early April, Google became the first company to negotiate an agreement with GSA through its OneGov strategy, which essentially treats government customers as a single large purchaser. Google offered a temporary 71% discount on Workspace through Sept. 30 for government customers, a discount Transportation took advantage of in this deal. More than a dozen tech companies followed Google’s lead in negotiating OneGov deals and discounting billions of dollars’ worth of software to government customers, many for a limited period of time.

“We’re excited to see agencies using the OneGov offerings to help deliver on their missions while also saving taxpayer dollars,” Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner Josh Gruenbaum said in a statement to Nextgov/FCW. “This outcome shows how diversity in the federal marketplace yields efficiency, prioritizing American taxpayers first.”

Transportation’s Workspace deal could be a harbinger of more widespread government adoption for Google, which launched its Google Public Sector division more than three years ago specifically to target government business.

While the Google Workspace suite is used by several large agencies, including GSA, the Energy Department and Air Force Research Laboratory, Microsoft’s 365 suite has been the dominant productivity and communications software across the federal government for more than a decade. Contracting documents indicate Transportation and its component agencies, like the Federal Aviation Administration, have long used Microsoft 365 for collaboration and communication needs. It’s unclear how this new deal with Google will impact its Microsoft relationship.

In a late June interview with Nextgov/FCW, Transportation Chief Information Officer Pavan Pidugu laid out his vision for the department's IT operations, focusing on process improvements, people and products. Pidugu said he wanted to remove shadow IT across the department, get rid of redundant IT systems, speed up acquisitions and shift the department and its it staff toward becoming a product-focused organization.