WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army has extended a contract with artificial intelligence and analytics firm BigBear.ai to build a global military information management system. The system provides military leaders with an automated, holistic view of their personnel, equipment, training, and overall readiness.
As we know, GFIM’s six-month extension is worth $8.5 million. It builds on a nine-month, $14.8 million contract announced at the end of 2022 and prototype work from the previous year.
This management system aims to consolidate a dozen older applications. It also automates many tasks that were once done manually, such as determining unit status.
“GFIM is a transformative capability of critical importance to the U.S. military, with the potential to revolutionize processes by enabling data-driven decision-making, automation of critical functions, and real-time visibility. ”said Ryan Legge of BigBear.ai. The President of Integrated Defense Solutions said in a June 12 statement:
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During the expansion period, BigBear.ai plans to move GFIM to the cARMY cloud. Modernizing the Army’s network and its underlying computer infrastructure is one of the Army’s priorities. Secretary of War Christine Wormuth said achieving digital fluency and data centricity is a secondary goal.
The BigBear.ai extension will be live following user testing in late May/early June. Attended by BigBear.ai staff, army leaders and technical experts related to GFIM. Army GFIM Capabilities Manager Lori Mongold said in a statement Monday that the system would be a “transformational leap in force management capabilities” if fully implemented.
Last month, BigBear.ai announced a partnership with L3Harris Technologies, the 10th largest defense contractor by revenue, according to an analysis by Defense News.
As part of the deal, BigBear.ai will provide L3Harris with its computer vision, predictive analytics, and related applications to improve naval crewed and unmanned teaming and foreign vessel identification and classification.
Colin Demarest is a reporter for C4ISRNET covering military networks, cyber and IT. Colin previously covered the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Agency, the Cold War cleanup and nuclear weapons development, for a daily South Carolina newspaper. Colin is also an award-winning photographer.
