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Pentagon Picks Microsoft Over Amazon For $ 10 Billion Contract – NPR, Npr.org

Pentagon Picks Microsoft Over Amazon For $ 10 Billion Contract – NPR, Npr.org


      

            

    

    

        

                In managing the contract, Microsoft will be responsible for storing massive amounts of sensitive military data and giving the U.S. military access to technologies like artificial intelligence.                                                                           Stephen Brashear / Getty Images                                                      hide caption            

            

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                 Stephen Brashear / Getty Images              

    

    

        

In managing the contract, Microsoft will be responsible for storing massive amounts of sensitive military data and giving the U.S. military access to technologies like artificial intelligence.

        

                         Stephen Brashear / Getty Images                          

   

   

The Pentagonawarded a $ (billion, 10 – year contractto Microsoft over Amazon on Friday, ending a heavily scrutinized battle over which tech giant would largely manage the military’s cloud computing services.

The massive contract – known as the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI, cloud contract – was widely expected to be awarded to Amazon Web Services, or AWS, which alsomanages the cloud computing servicesfor the Central Intelligence Agency.

“We’re surprised about this conclusion. AWS is the clear leader in cloud computing, and a detailed assessment purely on the comparative offerings clearly lead to a different conclusion,” an AWS spokesperson told NPR in a statement.

Amazon’s potential procurement of the contract was met with heavy criticism by other competitors, Republicans in Congress and eventually by President Trump, who has long been engaged in a largely one-sided feud with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.

            

                  

                

          

       

            

                  

Top Aide To Former Defense Chief James Mattis Recounts What The General Has Not

                

          

       

The winner-take-all bidding for the contract began in early 2018, and critics – includinganother competitor for the contract, Oracle– have argued that the Defense Department has unfairly favored Amazon over other potential vendors. Oracle and IBM unsuccessfully sued to block the award. TheGovernment Accountability Office determinedthe bidding process to be fair.

Those concerns eventually made their way to Capitol Hill. In June, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis.,requested that the Defense Department delaythe awarding of the contract pending an investigation of conflicts of interest. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Urged the Pentagon in July toconsider multiple vendorsfor its cloud computing services.

Also in July, Trump addressed the issue directly.

“I’m getting tremendous complaints about the contract with the Pentagon and with Amazon,”Trump told reporters.“We’re getting tremendous, really, complaints from other companies and from great companies. “

” I will be asking them to look at it very closely to see what’s going on because I have had very few things where there’s been such complaining, “he said. “We’ll take a very strong look at it.”

In early August, Defense Secretary Mark Esperannounced the Pentagonwould reexamine the project before announcing a winner. Esperrecused himself this weekof any decisions involving the cloud contract.

The Pentagon’s pausing of the contract bid processraised concernsthat the president intervened in the awarding of the defense contract, which would be aviolation of federal acquisition laws, according toThe Washington Post.

            

It’s important that we maintain a fair & competitive process for DoD contracts, but for the President to use the power of his office to punish critics in the media would be a complete abuse of power. This does not pass the smell test & we need some answershttps://t.co/3CqbwEXuX1

– Mark Warner (@MarkWarner)August 2, 2019

   

       

Trump has an openly contentious relationship with Amazon and in particular withThe Washington Post,which Bezos owns and is a frequent target of the president’s ire.

            

So sorry to hear the news about Jeff Bozo being taken down by a competitor whose reporting, I understand, is far more accurate than the reporting in his lobbyist newspaper, the Amazon Washington Post. Hopefully the paper will soon be placed in better & more responsible hands!

– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) (January) , 2019

   

       

In a new book,Holding the Line : Inside Trump’s Pentagon with Secretary Mattis,Guy Snodgrass, a retired Navy commander who worked closely with then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, writes that Trump called and directed Mattis to “screw Amazon” by locking it out of a chance to bid for the JEDI contract. According to Snodgrass, Mattis told him and others: “We’re not going to do that. This will be done by the book, both legally and ethically.”

In a statement detailing the award, the Defense Department said:

“The acquisition process was conducted in accordance with applicable laws and regulations. The process cleared review by the GAO and Court of Federal Claims. At the outset the competition included four different offerors.All offerors were treated fairly and evaluated consistently with the solicitation’s stated evaluation criteria. Prior to the award, the department conferred with the DOD Inspector General, which informed the decision to proceed. “

NPR reached out to Microsoft, but a spokesperson has not yet commented on the award.

In managing the JEDI contract, Microsoftwill be responsiblefor storing massive amounts of sensitive military data and giving the U.S. military access to technologies like artificial intelligence.

“We must improve the speed and effectiveness with which we develop and deploy modernized technical capabilities to our women and men in uniform,” Dana Deasy, the Defense Department’s chief information officer , said in a statement. “This award is an important step in execution of the Digital Modernization Strategy.”


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