Defense hands over commercial satellite procurement to GSA

The General Services Administration will manage the purchase of $5 billion worth of commercial satellite services during the next 10 years for all federal agencies, including the Defense Department, under an agreement announced on Thursday.

According to the pact between the agency and the Defense Information Systems Agency, GSA will manage the acquisition of satellite transponder capacity and satellite subscription services for the federal government through its information technology schedule 70 contracts and end-to-end contracts, including the purchase of satellite and terrestrial link services through new indefinite delivery-indefinite quantity contracts.

DISA had managed the acquisition of satellite services for Defense while GSA was in charge of the procurement of those services for the rest of government. Developing a single procurement platform for all federal commercial satellite services will result in "appreciable savings" due to economies of scale, among other things, said Karl Krumbholz, director of network services programs for GSA, at a press briefing on Thursday. He did not provide specific figures.

Bruce Bennett, DISA's director of satellite communications, said he expected savings of between 10 percent to 15 percent on the acquisition of satellite bandwidth through the new procurement program.

GSA said it planned to start rolling out new acquisitions for commercial satellite services in the first quarter of 2010.