Pentagon sticks with Microsoft for $10 bn cloud deal despite Amazon’s protests
08 September, 2020
The US Department of Defense said Friday it really is keeping its decision to award a $10 billion cloud computing contract to Microsoft, despite Amazon’s claims that President Donald Trump improperly influenced the process.
After another look at proposals for the “JEDI” cloud computing contract, the Pentagon concluded anew that Microsoft is the preferred choice.
“Microsoft’s proposal continues to represent the very best value to the federal government,” the department said in a statement, adding it really is “eager to begin delivering this capacity to our people in uniform.”
However, the contract can’t progress yet because of a federal court’s order putting it on hold while Amazon pursues a lawsuit over the way the bidding was handled, the Pentagon noted.
“We appreciate that after careful review, the DoD confirmed that people offered the right technology and the very best value,” Microsoft said.
“We’re ready to get to work and ensure that those that serve our country get access to anywhere near this much needed technology.”
The 10-year Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) programme will finally see all military branches sharing information in a cloud-based system boosted by artificial intelligence.
Amazon has alleged it had been shut from the deal because of Trump’s vendetta against the company and its leader Jeff Bezos.
The entrepreneur, who also owns The Washington Post, is a frequent target of the united states president, who claims the newspaper is biased against him.
Amazon is seeking testimony from Trump and other top officials on the reason why for awarding the lucrative deal to Microsoft.
Amazon contended in a weblog post that the DoD’s re-evaluation of bids was a “do-over” to let Microsoft fix a flawed proposal so US officials could “validate a flawed, biased, and politically corrupted decision.”
“You will find a recurring pattern to the way President Trump behaves when he’s called out for doing something egregious: first he denies carrying it out, then he searches for methods to push it off aside, to distract attention from it and delay efforts to investigate it,” Amazon said in the post.
“And then he eventually ends up doubling down on the egregious act anyway.”
Amazon was considered the lead contender to supply technology for JEDI, with Amazon Web Services dominating the cloud computing arena and the business already providing classified servers for other government agencies including the CIA.
Amazon argued in court papers that the Pentagon’s selection of Microsoft was mystifying if not for Trump’s repeated “expressed determination to, in the words of the president himself, ‘screw Amazon.’”
The protest filed in the US Court of Federal Claims urges that the rival JEDI bids be re-evaluated.
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