Verizon wins $400M FBI task order under EIS contract
Verizon has won a $400 million task order to support the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s network modernization under the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions contract, the company announced Tuesday.
Through the EIS contract, Verizon will help the FBI improve its connectivity as well as its data and voice solutions in support of its greater intelligence and law enforcement missions.
The task order is a re-award of work the FBI awarded Verizon last year that AT&T protested, but the Government Accountability Office quickly dismissed.
The telecom provider said in a release the award will help the FBI “meet increasing demands for data bandwidth around the globe successfully.”
“We understand the critical nature of the work we will do with the FBI to improve network availability, enhance operational efficiency, use tailored approaches to meet individual division needs, and help modernize technology,” Maggie Hallbach, senior vice president, public sector at Verizon, said in the release. “Building on nearly 20 years of partnership with the Bureau, this next phase will provide stable solutions and a modern network that is faster, more scalable and secure that will help the FBI achieve its mission.”
As part of the win, Verizon will also provide enhanced ethernet access capabilities, global virtual private network services and its 4G LTE and 5G Nationwide wireless, which it says enables “the move to wireless connections provisioned on-demand for faster deployment at FBI locations, and support for high-speed connectivity for FBI agents working in the field.”
The $50 billion EIS contract is a governmentwide vehicle meant to help agencies jumpstart the modernization of their aging IT and network infrastructures. But the transition to the contract has been a slog for many agencies, with deadlines looming for them to have their telecom portfolios transitioned off of legacy contracts by the end of this fiscal year.
Despite the expiration of those legacy contracts, like Networx, Washington Interagency Telecommunications System (WITS) 3 and other local telecom services, May 31, the General Services Administration decided to give agencies an option to continue those services for up to a year.
In January, 15 agencies received “F” grades for their EIS transitions during a biannual FITARA Scorecard hearing.
