Legislation that aims to level the playing fields for defense cloud computing and artificial intelligence technology providers is set for its second go-round in the Senate after failing to gain much traction late last year in the last Congress.
The bipartisan Protecting AI and Cloud Competition in Defense Act – slated to be introduced by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Eric Schmitt, R-Mo. – aims to regulate what the senators believe are technology monopolies dominating the Defense Department’s procurement field and enable smaller competitors to gain competitive access.
The legislation was first introduced in December but failed to make it out of committee before the start of the new Congress in early January.
“Right now, all of our eggs are in one giant Silicon Valley basket. That doesn’t only stifle innovation, but it’s more expensive and it seriously increases our security risks,” Sen. Warren had said in a press release from her office in December.
Google, Oracle, Microsoft, and Amazon are the cloud service providers that have awards to provide service in the Department of Defense’s (DoD) $9 billion Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability (JWCC) contract.
If the Senate bill becomes law, DoD contracts would have to prioritize the government’s role in intellectual property and data rights and security, interoperability, and auditability requirements, including modular open system approaches, “appropriate” work allocation and technology boundaries, and consideration of multi-cloud technology where feasible, according to text of last year’s legislation.
It would also require Pentagon contractors earning over $50 million annually from cloud, AI, or data services to undergo a competitive award process, giving the DoD exclusive data rights and tasking the department’s chief digital and artificial intelligence officer with securing AI defense information from unauthorized access.
In previewing the reintroduction of the bill, Sen. Warren touted a commitment from Michael Cadenazzi – the Trump administration’s nominee to be the next Assistant Secretary of Defense for Industrial Base Policy – to support the legislation and its goals.
“Artificial intelligence represents the most promising capabilities for transformational productivity and impact of the department,” said Cadenazzi during his nomination hearing on April 29. “I would be thrilled if confirmed to work with [Senator Warren] and Senator Schmidt on this issue,” he said.