Photo by Air Force Staff Sgt. Taylor Harrison
Sign up for our newsletter.
Science Applications International Corp.’s recent win of a $319 million Air Force contract gives the company the opportunity to flex its capabilities around command-and-control systems, digital systems engineering and cloud computing, all for a new customer.
“This is a great win for us because we don’t have a lot of command-and-control work with the Air Force,” Vinnie DiFronzo, SAIC’s senior vice president of operations for defense, said in an interview. “We have Space Force, the Army and the combatant commands but this is the first major Air Force C2 win for us.”
SAIC will partner with the Air Force’s Kessel Run division on the contract known as Falconer Air Operations Center Weapon System Sustainment. The Falconer program helps with planning, directing and assessing, air, space and cyberspace operations.
Air operations centers take in, analyze and disseminate command and control and intelligence data to support operations around the globe.
"The goal is better situational awareness and better decision making and decision making aids," DiFronzo told me.
The contract to support these centers have typically fallen to original equipment manufacturers, but DiFonzo said the award to SAIC indicates a shift in priorities.
“Cyber has always been a major priority but now there is more emphasis on the cloud and integration and being able to modernize the C2 software for a cloud infrastructure,” he said. “They are trying to get the benefits of the cloud as well as the benefits of how digital engineering has evolved.”
One major plus for SAIC in the competition for the Falconer contract is that the company is the prime contractor on the $727 million Air Force Cloud One contract for cloud hosting and platform services. It uses Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.
“We have extensive experience working with both the cloud service providers as well as working on the migration of legacy applications into the cloud from a transformation standpoint,” DiFronzo said.
A second major plus is the leadership team for SAIC, which includes a program manager with 30 years of experience working as a leader in the air operations center environment and a chief architect with extensive experience working with Kessel Run and modernization within the Air Force.
The contract also fits a defense trend where command-and-control systems must operate across the different domains of air, space, land, sea and cyber. The Falconer contract calls out cyber as one of its primary domains along with air and space.
“That is really key because of the change in the security environment over the last 15 years,” DiFronzo said. “This C2 system being modernized properly is really key to being able to gain full synergy between those different domains.”
The modernization is critical to the Air Force’s development an advanced battle management system and as part of the Defense Department-wide Joint All-Domain Command Control system known as JADC2.
The Falconer contract is about developing a mission planning tool that is tied all of the air operations centers at each of the regional combatant command communities. around the globe as well as being actively involved in combat operations, he said.
“There is the planning side and then there is the execution side,” DiFronzo said. “With an ongoing air war, it is the integration of that from the joint space, cyber and air standpoint that is managed through the (Falconer) Air Operation Center.”
The contract also is an example of how software drives everything and how IT plays a vital role in the mission of government agencies, particularly on the defense side of the market. Better sharing of data is critical.
“We have systems like the AOC (Air Operations Center) that have great information available internally but isn’t not fully integrated from a machine-to-machine standpoint,” DiFronzo said. “As you modernize, you are able to improve the data architecture and the networking so you can better leverage things like artificial intelligence.”
The Air Force has been on a path toward better software development by adopting more DevSecOps and agile development.
“I think that’s one of the reasons they picked us is they understood we could help them accelerate that,” DiFronzo said. “We are very excited to have the kind of partner that is looking towards the future and being able to fully leverage evolving technologies.”
NEXT STORY: Boeing, Northrop Grumman join group pushing 3D printing to small suppliers
Do Not Sell My Personal Information
When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.
Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active
We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.
Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies
Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link
If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.
Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.
Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.
If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page. Save Settings
A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:
We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.
We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.
We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.
We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.
We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.
We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.
Insider Customer Service 800-353-9118 or email washingtontechnology@omeda.com
Help us tailor content specifically for you: