AT&T was awarded a new contract with the U.S. Army to modernize the military arm’s communications infrastructure serving about 1 million users.
Financial terms of the agreement were not revealed.
As a global agreement, AT&T said its services will enable Army personnel to connect, collaborate and share information in support of daily operations. Some of these services include voice, video, chat, instant messaging, presence and screen sharing.
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Army mechanics overseas will be able to share screens with experts at a home station to speed repairs, while commanders and their staffs will be able to use live video links to collaborate across different locations or direct troop operations abroad. Since these services are cloud-based and managed by AT&T, the Army will not need to buy new equipment to take advantage of them.
The U.S. Army's modernization efforts are part of a broader initiative facilitated by the Department of Defense to maintain the military's technology stance by using commercial cloud services. AT&T said they are delivering these services in “classified and highly secure unclassified formats.”
Winning this deal is also important for AT&T as another proof point it can use to assist other agency customers to transition from the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Networx to the upcoming Enterprise Infrastructure Services (EIS) contract. AT&T, CenturyLink, Verizon, and MetTel were among a group of 10 companies that secured a seat on the GSA's 15-year, $50 billion EIS contract.