The Department of Defense (DoD) has awarded at least 47 task orders under its $9 billion multi-vendor cloud contract and expects to deliver more in the coming year, DoD Chief Information Officer (CIO) John Sherman told lawmakers on Friday.
During a March 22 House Armed Services Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation Subcommittee hearing, Sherman updated the task award total through DoD’s Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability (JWCC) program, and said that more than 50 additional task orders are in the pipeline.
Nearly two years ago the Pentagon selected Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Oracle for its long-anticipated JWCC contract, a follow-up to the Pentagon’s failed $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) arrangement.
“Following our award of the [JWCC] contract in December 2022, DoD Components now have access to commercial cloud computing at all three security classifications, from the headquarters to the tactical edge,” Sherman said.
Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) Director Lt. Gen. Robert Skinner told lawmakers that during the first year of JWCC, DISA — the agency charged with running the JWCC program — focused on helping mission partners with cloud service acquisition and adoption.
“We published guidance for the use of JWCC and cloud rationalization to streamline cloud contracting and reduce contract sprawl across the Department,” Skinner said.
Some of the task orders’ efforts are associated with Combined Joint All Domain Command and Control (CJADC2). CJADC2 is a rebranded version of the DoD’s Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) effort — the department’s multi-domain initiative to integrate sensors across air, land, sea, cyber and now, allied network domains — to reflect a combined JADC2 development that will provide defense leaders real-time command data.
According to Sherman, JWCC is “critical to enabling [CJADC2] and other important efforts, such as modern software development and artificial intelligence.”
“It is critical more than ever that we provide DoD personnel with secure and resilient software when and where they need it. We recognize the urgency of this issue and are working hard to ensure we are successful,” Sherman said.
In other cloud-related news, Skinner told committee members that the DoD “successfully deployed an initial overseas cloud supporting Indo-Pacific Command missions.”
According to Skinner, DISA in the last 12 months deployed the initial outside the continental United States (OCONUS) commercial cloud capability in support of Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) missions.
“This OCONUS cloud capability will establish the OCONUS portion of the global, resilient, and secure information environment that supports the National Defense Strategy’s top priorities,” Skinner said.
Specifically, the OCONUS cloud enables warfighting and mission command, resulting in improved agility, greater lethality, and improved decision-making at all levels, he added.
DISA unveiled its OCONUS cloud service push in August 2023 by announcing that its Stratus private cloud solution was operational at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, marking a step forward in the agency’s work to establish a global cloud infrastructure.
DISA plans to extend the private cloud solution further into the INDOPACOM region.
