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This Week in Public Sector Innovation

September 20, 2012 By

Issa Posts Discussion Draft of IT Procurement Reform Bill: On Thursday, Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee posted a discussion draft of legislation aimed at improving IT acquisition practices. View the draft here. In response, SIIA issued a statement applauding Chairman Issa for his effort and acknowledging that we look forward to working with the Committee to craft a final bill that will improve IT acquisition for the benefit of vendors and the federal government. View the blog post here.

Cloud Brokerage RFI: This week SIIA’s Public Sector Innovation Group submitted formal comments in response to GSA’s Cloud Brokerage RFI. The comments highlight the need for GSA to work with industry to better define the cloud broker concept, ensure competition in the federal procurement process, optimize the value of software licensing and avoid potential conflicts of interest. The full comments can be viewed here.

NJVC Opens Cloud Brokerage for Federal Government: In related cloud broker news, NJVC, an IT consulting and managed services firm operating in the defense and intelligence arena, launched a multi- cloud broker service for the federal government that will let agencies try, design and price an array of services from cloud providers before spending money and committing to large-scale migration. See GCN’s coverage of it here.

FedRAMP Update: Since the announcement of the first 10 accredited third-party assessment organizations (3PAOs) in June, GSA has added 6 more to the approved list, the latest being Kratos Defense and Security Solutions, which was announced this week. To date no company has received its provisional authorization under the FedRAMP program although GSA expects to have 3 companies approved under the program by the end of the calendar year. See more on FedRAMP here.

Michael Hettinger is VP for the Public Sector Innovation Group (PSIG) at SIIA. Follow his PSIG tweets at @SIIAPSIG.

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Filed Under: Cloud/Gov, PSIG, Software Events Tagged With:

This Week in the Federal Cloud: April 23-27

April 27, 2012 By

Probably the biggest cloud event this week was the Salesforce.com Cloud Force event held on Wednesday at the DC Convention Center. The more than 1000 attendees were treated to a keynote presentation by former Federal CIO, Vivek Kundra. The event focused heavily on the use of social media in the corporate world but also featured the announcement of the launching of Salesforce’s government cloud.

This week also featured the launching of the Cloud Computing Exchange by Meritalk. The Cloud Computing Exchange, like Meritalk’s other “exchanges” is designed to foster discussion and the sharing of best practices among government and industry. The first quarterly meeting of the exchange featured a keynote by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) highlighting their recent transition to Google Apps for Government to manage their email system. The Meritalk Cloud Computing Exchange was followed by a Capitol Hill Brainstorming Session with keynotes from Senators Tom Carper (DE) and Scott Brown (MA) as well as panels of government and industry cloud leaders, including SIIA Members Google and IBM.

In other cloud news:

Michael Hettinger is VP for the Public Sector Innovation Group (PSIG) at SIIA. Follow his PSIG tweets at @SIIAPSIG.

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Filed Under: Cloud Computing, Government, Policy, Policy - Cloud Computing, PSIG, Software Tagged With: ,

SIIA Launches Public Sector Innovation Group to Address Changes to the IT Acquisition Environment

March 15, 2012 By

SIIA today announced the launch of a new membership group to help technology firms take advantage of the evolving Federal investment in cloud-related technologies. SIIA also announced that it has brought on Mike Hettinger, a Capitol Hill veteran and leading expert on public sector management, to direct the new division.

Called the Public Sector Innovation Group (PSIG), this new membership division will help cloud service providers and Third Party Assessment Organizations (3PAO) take advantage of the evolving Federal investment in cloud-related technologies. PSIG is the only organization of its kind to serve this innovative segment of the public sector technology market. While SIIA been a leader for years in guiding tech companies in the government procurement process, the formation of PSIG reflects the dramatically changed government marketplace.

The move to the cloud is an enormous opportunity for many government contractors. The creation of PSIG will help SIIA members understand the changing landscape, seize upon new government initiatives, and generally be better positioned for success with Federal IT procurement.

SIIA has been guiding our members through this process for six years, with our annual Cloud/Gov conference at the centerpiece. When the Federal government issued its ‘Cloud First’ policy last year and adopted the FedRAMP Concept of Operations, we knew it was time to do more to help our members understand the impact of changes to the IT acquisition environment.

Hettinger most recently served as Executive Director overseeing Strategic Planning and Market Development in Grant Thornton’s Global Public Sector Practice, where he was responsible for firm-wide strategic business planning, federal marketing, and external relations. Prior to joining Grant Thornton, Hettinger was the staff director of the House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform, Subcommittee on Government Management, Finance and Accountability. Hettinger also has an extensive background in public affairs, having served as a Public Policy Counselor at Patton Boggs LLP, where he oversaw large-scale lobbying and public affairs campaigns. Prior to joining Patton Boggs, Hettinger was Chief of Staff to Representative Tom Davis of Virginia.

Read more about PSIG in today’s Government Computer News feature.

Laura Greenback is Communications Director at SIIA.

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Filed Under: Cloud Computing, Government, Policy, Policy - Cloud Computing, PSIG, SIIA News, Software Tagged With: , , ,