Sorry, AWS and Azure: DoD Cancels JEDI Cloud Contract

The Department of Defense (DoD) has canceled the $10 billion JEDI cloud contract. Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure have been locked in never-ending legal fights for the contract.

The DoD said due to evolving requirements, increased cloud conversancy and industry advances, the JEDI contract no longer meets its needs. The Department continues to have unmet cloud capability gaps. These needs have only advanced in recent years with efforts such as Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) and the Artificial Intelligence and Data Acceleration (ADA) initiative.

JEDI Outdated

John Sherman is the DoD’s acting chief information officer.

DoD’s John Sherman

“JEDI was developed at a time when the Department’s needs were different and both the cloud service providers’ (CSPs) technology and our cloud conversancy [were] less mature,” he said. “In light of new initiatives like JADC2 and ADA, the evolution of the cloud ecosystem within DoD, and changes in user requirements to leverage multiple cloud environments to execute mission, our landscape has advanced and a new way-ahead is warranted to achieve dominance in both traditional and nontraditional warfighting domains.”

AWS expected to win the JEDI project. However, the Pentagon instead awarded it to Microsoft. AWS blamed then-President Trump and his feelings toward outgoing Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. Judges have sided with AWS, blocking Microsoft’s ability to start work on JEDI. The effort to upgrade the military’s systems to modern cloud computing then stalled.

Concurrent with the cancelation of the JEDI request for proposals (RFP), the DoD announced its intent for new cloud efforts. The Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability (JWCC) will be a multicloud/multivendor, indefinite delivery-indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract. The Department intends to seek proposals from a limited number of sources, namely Microsoft and AWS. Available market research indicates these two vendors are the only CSPs capable of meeting the department’s requirements.

However, the Department of Defense will determine whether any other U.S.-based CSPs can also meet its requirements. If so, the DoD will also negotiate with those companies.