The Department of Defense (DoD) is taking major steps to boost cloud performance, with the promise of a tangible, positive impact on military missions throughout the world. Specifically, the Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability (JWCC) contract is replacing the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) initiative, which was intended to establish enterprise-class cloud capabilities for the military community.

At this year’s Department of the Navy (DON) IT Conference, the U.S. Marine Corps discussed its enterprise cloud delivery strategy and how it is derived from its mission to evolve antiquated networks. Before, a Marine working out of headquarters or a U.S. base would use enterprise systems, applications, and infrastructure, but when a Marine goes out in the field, a new email and identity are assigned to operate from different servers and shared drives. For the Marine Corps, that approach is going by the wayside.

"Zero Trust is a cybersecurity strategy and framework that embeds IT security mechanisms throughout an architecture that generate metadata used to secure, manage, and monitor every device user, application, and network transaction at the perimeter and within every network enclave."

From the Department of Defense (DoD) Zero Trust Reference Architecture v1.0

There has been an increased focus among U.S. government agencies on adapting to modern IT environments and enhancing cybersecurity solutions. This increased focus on security government networks, data, and critical infrastructure is a result of ongoing digital transformation initiatives that are resulting in more mission-critical connected systems and more data for agencies to secure. It’s also a result of the increased number of cyberattacks and more sophisticated cyber-criminals that are targeting our nation’s networks.

If you have been looking for the right time to sell your technology product or service to the state, local and education (SLED) market, now is the time to act. With thirty-six states beginning their fiscal year on July 1st, now is the time to position yourself to take advantage of a confluence of once-in-a-lifetime conditions that have left the SLED market booming with opportunity. Here are some of the factors driving that opportunity:

New Leadership

The COVID-19 pandemic has spurned greater demand for health information technology (IT) by demonstrating the importance of having robust medical research, health surveillance and healthcare systems capable of rapidly responding to new and developing situations, something which requires strong IT investment in big data, cybersecurity and cloud. In addition, both the pandemic and emerging technologies have led to numerous changes within the healthcare industry, such as telehealth expansion and increased use of wearables, which necessitate robust health IT solutions.

On December 8, 2021, the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) released its 2022 annual top 10 priorities list identifying the most pressing technology and policy issues that state CIOs are prioritizing for the upcoming year.

What is the difference between AI and ML?
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are two of the most transformative technologies in the computing space that are changing the world in which we live. However, there is often confusion in in what constitutes Artificial Intelligence, and what constitutes Machine Learning.

Recent signals by the U.S. federal government suggest that customer experience (CX), primarily citizen-facing services will receive attention and investment from funding sources like the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF). The initial $311 million awarded by the TMF primarily went to projects focused on cybersecurity in keeping with stated priorities and the prevalence of cybersecurity threats. From the beginning, however, TMF has emphasized CX projects that focus on how taxpayers engage with government services in secure digital environments.

The concept of cloud computing has been around for many years now. Anyone positioned in the information technology (IT) world knows the language: SaaS, PaaS, IaaS, multi-cloud, hybrid, on-prem, and the list goes on. How has the concept of cloud morphed? More importantly, what are the cloud buzzwords and concepts that you should be aware of to get in front of end-users? Edge computing, data-centric architecture and sky computing are emerging, and here to stay. Let’s break down what each is and its current or future role in the U.S. federal market.