House bill looks to bank software savings

A new House bill would put the onus on agency CIOs to extract savings from their portfolios of software licenses.

If passed into law, the Megabyte Act (short for Making Electronic Government Accountable By Yielding Tangible Efficiencies Act) mandates that the Office of Management and Budget issue directives to agency CIOs to make an inventory of existing software licenses, identify ways to make software acquisition more efficient and report on savings or cost avoidance in a public report.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.), passed out of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on April 14.

A nearly identical bill sponsored by Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) was referred to the full Senate by that chamber's Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee in February.  

Inefficient software licensing has nagged government for years. A recently announced White House plan looks to trim the government’s $9 billion spend on software licenses. That proposal drew a range of comments from industry and advocacy groups.