No one expected the Navy-Marine Corps Intranet program would be trouble free. After all, it's an eight-year, $6.9 billion project that eventually will connect 360,000 desktops to an integrated network.
Those two lines leading from your office wall ? one goes into your computer, and the other into your phone ? soon could be replaced by a single cable that transmits both voice and data. The buzzword is "convergence," and agencies are increasingly gearing their contracts to consolidate voice and data services.
The aerospace industry will see strong growth in information technologies and solutions needed to bolster homeland defense, a top industry official said Dec. 12.
The events of Sept. 11 have ignited calls in some quarters for a national identification system that could help track potential terrorists and prevent future attacks.
This isn't your grandfather's Army radio. In fact, the Army's next-generation radio, now being developed under the Joint Tactical Radio System program, or JTRS, is really just a computer with a radio front end, according to one industry official.
Some call it the clash of the titans. Systems integrators and communications companies are battling to see which kind of company is best qualified to be prime contractor on government contracts that combine telecom and information technology services into a single contract.
Undoubtedly, we all will remember what we were doing when we first heard of the horrific terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. Perhaps, too, we will recall Sept. 11 as a demarcation between life as it was then and life as it is now.
Venture capitalists have taken some hits in the past year with dot-coms and other startups failing at a rapid rate, but that hasn't deterred the Central Intelligence Agency from using a little seed money to find the technologies it needs.
Companies that provide telecommunications services to federal agencies under the Metropolitan Area Acquisition program are potentially disadvantaged when they compete for business against incumbent providers, according to the General Accounting Office.
Since the publication of our last issue trumpeting Affiliated Computer Services Inc.'s purchase of SCT Corp.'s state and local government unit ["<a href="http://www.washingtontechnology.com/news/16_8/business/16855-1.html">ACS Joins Elite With Purchase of SCT Unit</a>," July 16] ACS surprised the government IT community with another deal, announcing July 19 it is buying Lockheed Martin Corp.'s state and local unit for $825 million.
The Bush administration is looking to rein in government spending on information technology by getting rid of "fad portals" and other unnecessary technology projects, said Mark Forman, the new federal IT chief. Forman said that Mitchell Daniels, Office of Management and Budget director, has said too much is being spent on IT.
He said, she said. A recent survey of workers found that men are more much optimistic about a woman's chances for getting ahead in the high-tech arena than are women.
The information technology industry is applauding indications that the Bush administration wants to accelerate the trend toward outsourcing government jobs and responsibilities deemed essentially nongovernmental.
