GSA and Unisys/Google Marks GovCloud Watershed

As widely reported this week, the United States General Services Administration (GSA) has awarded a contract to Unisys to create a secure cloud-based email and collaboration platform. The solution will be based on Google Apps for Government and is expected to save $15M over the next five years when compared to current staff, infrastructure, and contract support costs.

The award will provide up to 17,000 GSA employees and contractors worldwide with enhanced collaboration services, including email with expanded storage, as well as full access to Google Apps collaboration tools including Google Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs and Google Sites.

The government also extended the public comment period for the The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program or FedRAMP. This program has been established to provide a standard approach to Assessing and Authorizing (A&A) cloud computing services and products. FedRAMP allows joint authorizations and continuous security monitoring services for Government and Commercial cloud computing systems intended for multi-agency use. The risk model will also enable the government to “approve once, and use often” by ensuring multiple agencies gain the benefit and insight of the FedRAMP’s Authorization and access to service provider’s authorization packages.

In 2009 the government discovered cloud computing. Now 2010 is clearly the year of implementation.

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