MetTel taps former AT&T exec to lead federal program

MetTel announced on Thursday that it has hired former AT&T executive Robert Dapkiewicz to lead its federal program. Dapkiewicz is now general manager and senior vice president of MetTel's federal program, and is based in Washington D.C. Dapkiewicz spent more than 20 years in various senior executive positions at AT&T in both commercial and government sectors.

"Rob's solid track record of success in sales, marketing, product development and strategic planning will be a tremendous asset to MetTel," said MetTel CEO Marshall Aronow, in a statement. "His deep knowledge of voice, data networking, mobility solutions and applications will complement our high-performing federal team."

In December, MetTel received full authority to operate under the General Services Administration's Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) program. EIS is GSA's 15-year, $50 billion program that was designed to award various contracts to vendors that help federal agencies to buy and update their IT and telecommunications infrastructure services. It's an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) program that serves as the follow-on to GSA's Networx, WITS3 and regional telecommunications services contracts.

As part of the EIS program, MetTel is now authorized to provide federal agencies with voice, video, data transport, hosting and cloud services, as well as call centers, associated labor services, cable and wiring, and managed network and managed security services.

Robert Dapkiewicz

MetTel has racked up several government contract wins ncluding one to provide the United States Mint with broadband and wireless services. Last month, the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) picked MetTel for its Infrastructure and Communications Solutions (GICS) Enterprise Information Solutions (EIS) Task Order 1 – Network, and Task Order 2 – Voice, with a combined value of more than $230 million over 13 years including all options.

EIS gives federal agencies the flexibility and agility to migrate to modern communications and IT services that meet government security standards. GSA is extending the transition deadline from 2020 to 2023 to give federal agencies more time to transition from legacy contracts, such as Networx, to EIS.

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CenturyLink in particular has been successful this year in winning contracts through the General Services Administration's EIS program. CenturyLink was the first supplier to receive authority to operate under the General Service Administration's EIS contract last year. Since then, the company has landed contracts with the Department of the Interior, the Department of Defense and the Social Security Administration.