Veterans Affairs kicks off cloud e-mail

The Veterans Affairs Department embarked on a project Thursday to move its e-mail services onto a cloud computing environment in four contractor-owned data centers, the largest such program to date in the federal government.

In its request for information to potential vendors , VA said the cloud project will manage 600,000 Microsoft Exchange e-mail boxes, mobile BlackBerry e-mail and Microsoft SharePoint collaboration software, as well as provide extensive storage, backup and archiving systems.

Mary Lamb, a specialist with Suss Consulting, estimated the value of the cloud project at $150 million.

Industry sources speculated that the VA project, formally known as the Big4 Hosted Cloud - Enterprise Exchange, Archive, Backup and Storage System, could prompt a battle royal between Google and Microsoft, as each jockeys for dominance in the federal cloud marketplace.

Federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra has estimated that cloud computing will account for one fourth of the $80 billion federal information technology budget within a few years.

Google spokesman Andrew Kovacs said the company does not comment on active procurements, but he added, "We remain focused on bringing cloud computing to the public sector to help it take advantage of more powerful technology, at a lower cost, with better security."

Microsoft public sector officials were unavailable for comment as they were returning to Washington from a weeklong meeting at company headquarters in Redmond, Wash.

Ed Meagher, vice president for Computer Sciences Corp.'s North American public sector civil and health services group (who served as VA deputy CIO in 2006), said what VA wants to do with its cloud project is to manage its e-mail as a commodity on an enterprise level, a change he said will result in significant savings, but declined to quantify.

But, Meagher added, security and privacy stand out the biggest challenges for any vendor bidding on the VA cloud.

Lamb agreed, saying security is of "critical importance to the VA. It needs a lock-tight solution."

Meager declined comment on any battle between Google and Microsoft for the VA procurement, but pointed out that CSC, which plans to bid on the VA e-mail cloud, has experience with both in the provision of cloud e-mail services to government customers. CSC uses a Microsoft cloud for the e-mail system it runs for the State of California and a Google cloud to provide e-mail to the City of Los Angeles.

VA has the cloud RFI on a fast track, and wants responses from vendors by March 14.