SAN DIEGO \u2013 Patrick Shanahan, deputy secretary for the Department of Defense, has taken the lead for broader cloud adoption at the agency and used a Feb. 6 press gaggle at the AFCEA West conference to explain his optimism for that technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The cloud is part of Shanahan\u2019s broader philosophy to \u201cre-wire technology\u201d across the department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here\u2019s what he said about the Defense Department\u2019s cloud strategy:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– \u201cThe cloud is not our goal. Our goal is to get a lot of our data into an environment where we can make better decisions.\u201d This is a common talking point across the DoD and civilian government agencies as leaders want to move away from what they describe as \u201csiloed\u201d information and into an environment where they can quickly integrate data from a variety of sources. Once that\u2019s done, officials believe they can create new efficiencies that would could save time and money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– Shanahan said he wants a cloud strategy that can scale departmentwide. This is no easy task as the DoD represents the government\u2019s largest user base and largest IT department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– \u201cIf you\u2019re moving to the cloud, then you have to stop doing something you\u2019re doing today. The thing I want to ensure does not happen is that we keep the legacy systems and move to an environment where we can be more productive.\u201d About 80 percent of IT spending across the federal government is thought to be spent on legacy infrastructure. At some agencies, that figure tops 90 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– \u201cCloud is a huge enabler so that we can get to something industry has done for a long time and that is have enterprisewide services. The fact that the Army has its own financial system, the Navy … that\u2019s all redundancy that comes with cost.\u201d Cloud, Shanahan alluded to, would allow a move to one financial system. This technology is often referred to as shared services and is a pillar of the Trump administration\u2019s IT plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– \u201cThe individual contracts aren\u2019t as important as the cloud strategy that we\u2019re putting in place.\u201d Speaks for itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– \u201cWhat we\u2019re trying to do there is … we can capture the benefits and how do we make sure we can make it competitive long-term \u2026 It\u2019s all about maintaining low, or no, switching costs [between companies].\u201d Shanahan wants competition among cloud providers with lower prices and improved capabilities, so the department can make its dollars go further.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Patrick Shanahan, the deputy secretary for the Department of Defense, used a press gaggle Feb. 6 to explain his optimism for broader cloud adoption at the Pentagon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":27669,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[106,29,32,25,110],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3361],"class_list":["post-21136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-brief","category-home","category-newsletters","category-show-reporter","category-show-reporter-newsletters"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"FGOZUHMRVFA7VBYWRD26MO33WA","arc_canonical_url":"\/show-reporter\/afcea-west\/2018\/02\/07\/six-reasons-the-pentagons-deputy-secretary-is-excited-about-the-cloud\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n