GD Awarded Air Force Intelligence System Support Contract

General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT) announced today it will support the U.S. Air Force's 480th Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Wing (480 ISRW) through their Technical Operations Support contract. The single-award contract holds a total estimated value of $217 million. It includes a nine-month base period with seven one-year options as well as a possible six-month extension.

"We are excited to continue our strong legacy providing expert engineering and technology solutions for the Air Force," said Senior Vice President Leigh Palmer, head of GDIT's Defense Division. "GDIT's team developed and implemented the initial design for this global network. We will leverage this expertise to maintain current network technology while seamlessly modernizing the Air Force's global network into a next-generation posture."

The Air Force Distributed Common Ground System (AF DCGS), also referred to as the AN/GSQ-272 SENTINEL, is the Air Force's primary ISR planning, collection, processing and exploitation, analysis and dissemination weapon system. It employs a global communications architecture that connects multiple intelligence platforms, Department of Defense networks and sensors. The AF DCGS weapon systems' communications architecture is a complicated, high-speed network that supports combatant commanders across the globe.

The 480th leads global ISR operations within the AF DCGS' weapon system. They provide time-sensitive, Multiple-source Intelligence (Multi-INT) data and products derived from selected service/allied/coalition ISR platforms. AF DCGS participates in operations throughout the world, including those led by the United Nations, NATO, U.S. Africa Command, U.S. Central Command, U.S. European Command, U.S. Forces Korea, U.S. Northern Command, U.S. Pacific Command and U.S. Southern Command.

GDIT's legacy operations have been the sole network support provider of this weapons system for more than 20 years. Through this task order, GDIT will support the AF DCGS Operations Center with network administration, network engineering, information assurance, computer network defense, systems administration, project management and C4ISR engineering of 480 ISRW's information technology assets from the network and enterprise level.