Intercepts

Is Price right for DOD CIO?

We hear a possible candidate for the top widget, gadget and gizmo job at the Pentagon is Steven Price. From 2001 to 2003, he served as the first deputy assistant secretary of Defense for spectrum and command, control and communications policy.

Texans for Public Justice cite Price as a Major League Pioneer fund raiser for President Bush. Members of the political watchdog group said Price helped raise between $100,000 and $200,000 for Bush's re-election campaign.

In April, the graduate of Brown and Columbia universities became a general partner at Spectrum Equity Investors, a private firm based in Boston. He previously worked as president and chief executive officer of LiveWire Capital, an investment and management group in White Plains, N.Y.

Price's secretary said he could not return a phone call for comment last month because he was in meetings. She did not say where. Perhaps the White House?

AKO chosen ones

Add Booz Allen Hamilton and EDS to the list of companies from whom Army techies want to get proposals for the Army Knowledge Online (AKO) Enterprise Services procurement.

The Interceptors heard from an official at one of the firms we unintentionally left out of an FCW.com story posted last month that listed the companies Army officials have encouraged to submit bids for the multimillion-dollar Web portal management program. Those companies include IBM, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, SI International, CherryRoad Technologies, Computer Sciences Corp. and Science Applications International Corp.

That makes nine vying for the AKO lead systems integrator deal. We hear that's too many for the contract gurus at Acquisition Solutions, who helped Army officials craft the upcoming procurement.

They recommend limiting invitees to five companies.

Army GIG-BE nodes

According to an Army document, three of the 10 operational GIG-BE nodes reside at U.S. service bases. It did not name them, but good guesses are Fort Campbell, Ky.; Fort Hood, Texas; and Fort Stewart, Ga.

The 37-slide PowerPoint presentation showed that 28 Army sites here and abroad will connect to the fast fiber network when it kicks into high gear a year from now. They include 18 sites in America, three in Europe and seven in the Pacific Ocean region.

FCS fuss

Army officials downplayed a story last month in The Wall Street Journal that questioned if Boeing could lose its role as lead systems integrator for the Future Combat Systems (FCS) program because of the company's involvement in the troubled Air Force aerial refueling tanker deal.

They said in a statement that Defense Department, Army and government officials conducted more than 15 reviews of the multibillion-dollar program since it started in 2001. Another one completed in August by the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), which is funded by the military, concluded "that the program's approach to competitively selecting the lead systems integrator was sound, and its review of the lead systems integrator's ethics program did not reveal any specific concern."

We'd like to read the report titled "IDA Review of FCS Management" if someone would send us a copy. Is our favorite helicopter consultant listening?

Navy confidential

We hear Navy officials will not discuss the findings of an independent panel they commissioned to study the best targeting pod for the service's aircraft. They focused on Raytheon's Advanced Targeting Forward-Looking Infrared, Lockheed Martin's Sniper and Northrop Grumman's Litening pods.

An interested industry leader wants to know why Navy officials will not say which pod won and why they spent time and money for yet another targeting pod drill. We do, too.

Intercept something? Send it to bbrewin@fcw.com or ftiboni@fcw.com.