CENTECH Group, Falls Church, Va., is being awarded an $11,274,760 firm-fixed-price indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for operation and maintenance services of base telecommunications systems. The 99th Contracting Squadron, Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., is the contracting activity.
Lockheed Martin Information Systems & Global Solutions Division, Manassas, Virginia, was awarded an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract that includes a mix of firm-fixed-price, fixed-price with incentive, cost-plus-incentive-fee, and cost-plus and fixed-fee pricing plans. The contract is for worldwide support services necessary to carry out the day-to-day operations of Global Information Grid networks and related services, and to sustain the existing network and subsequent technology enhancement. The total cumulative face value of the contract is $1,911,000,000. The performance period includes a base period of performance of three years, from July 9, 2012 through July 8, 2015, and two two-year option periods, for a total period of seven years. Performance will predominantly be within the continental United States; however, support services are also required at multiple locations outside the continental United States. Defense Information Technology Contracting Organization, Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, is the contracting activity.
SBC Global Services Incorporated, Honolulu, Hawaii, is being awarded a $7 million contract to provide consolidated telecommunications services to the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Port Hueneme, California. The Port Hueneme Division, Naval Surface Warfare Center is the contracting activity.
Back in 1988 when the average price of gasoline was $1.12 a gallon, the U.S. government was selling long-distance telephone service to federal agencies for about 28 cents a minute. Over the past 18 years, however, while the cost of a gallon of gasoline has more than doubled, that same long-distance minute now costs slightly more than a penny. To enable federal agencies to take advantage of today's falling prices and rising technology, the U.S. General Services Administration later this year will award two contracts that will serve as the primary replacement for the expiring Federal Technology Service (FTS) 2001 and FTS2001 Crossover contracts.
The plethora of satellite communications options now available to ground-based users has induced one company to offer its customers a wide range of products and capabilities. This market-driven strategy addresses a growing trend in which satellite users face an expanding and confusing variety of services and providers.
One regional Bell operating company is introducing advanced telecommunications to rural communities to help people in remote locations realize the potential benefits of technology. The company provides wireline, wireless and connectivity solutions to businesses, federal agencies and military organizations both inside and outside of its 14-state region, which covers areas within the midwestern and western United States. The firm also works with many federal agencies, including the General Services Administration, the Department of the Treasury, the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Energy, to provide voice, data and video equipment, and solutions.
The solution for providing bandwidth on demand may be for telecommunications providers to imitate electric companies. Treating bandwidth as a utility is an approach that one major telecommunications provider believes could be the communications wave of the future. By ordering bandwidth as needed via a new communications system, users could extend or cut back their capabilities and pay only for what they use. For the military, which often needs to increase capabilities during an exercise, the technology allows this increase in use without installation of additional or bigger lines that could stand unused most of the time.
The same wires that carry voice transmissions to individual telephones within an organization are now delivering data, television-quality video and stereo-quality sound directly to the desktop. This allows businesses and agencies to provide multipoint videoconferencing, video-broadcast and video-on-demand capabilities to employees without installing additional infrastructures or overloading existing information technology components or networks.
Powerful forces of private-sector competition and an onslaught of technical advances are propelling the United States into a telecommunications renaissance era. In every sector-wireless, wireline, local and long distance, video and Internet-more services are being delivered at lower prices and higher bandwidth.
As militaries, governments and businesses continue to struggle with the obstacles posed by bandwidth limitations, scientists in industry and research laboratories are improving compression technologies to allow high-quality images and text to be sent to the desktop-or palmtop-with phenomenal speed. The proposition is simple: Until scientists design a way to make the communications pipelines larger, engineers must make the volume of data smaller.
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