This week’s post concludes my series on the spending data for cloud-related prototypes by taking a look at the data for the U.S. Navy. I’ll be including the U.S. Marine Corps as well. The Navy started slowly using Other Transaction Authority (OTA) to acquire information technology prototypes compared to the other parts of the Department of Defense. Since those early years, however, the Navy has caught up, with the data showing that its OTA spending for cloud-based prototypes is growing.

Total Cloud-Related OTA Spending, FY 2020-2022

The obligations data for cloud-related OTAs reveals that the Navy spent $133M in FY 2022. Over three-years, it spent a total of $255.5M on cloud-related prototypes. The Navy’s rising spending trend is similar to that of the Army and the Fourth Estate. It is in this sense unlike the Air Force’s cloud OTA spending, which has trended down since FY 2020.

The Navy’s spending on cloud-related prototypes has also been remarkably stable, rising in the range of  $47M per year.

Cloud-Related OTA Spending by Navy Organization, FY 2020-2022

The predominance of the Naval Information Warfare Systems Command (NAVWAR) at the top of the chart is to be expected as the Naval Information Warfare Centers in Charleston and San Diego are two of the most active cloud computing users in the service.

The cloud-related projects that make up NAVWAR’s spending are:

• Naval Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul Solution - $106M
• Naval Operations Supply System Solution - $48M
• Information Warfare Research Project - $3.4M (New Start)
• Integrating Modern Capabilities into a Global Secure Environment - $3.0M (New Start)
• Persistent Cyber Training Environment Cyber Innovation Challenge No. 4 - $2.0M (New Start)

Overall spending grew every year from FY 2020, hitting its highest total in FY 2022 with the start of three new programs.

Concerning the Naval Sea Systems Command, it spent on the following programs. Readers will please note that NAVSEA started only one new program in FY 2022:

• IaaS for Disconnected/Intermittent Connectivity Shipboard Installation - $35M
• Information Warfare Research Project - $9.4M (New Start)
• Agile Software Development - $9.9M
• Software Factory and DevOps Prototypes - $2.0M
• Prototype IaaS Delivery - $1.0M (Wrapped in FY 2021)
• MLS Cloud Infrastructure - $462K (Wrapped in FY 2021)

Marine Corps Systems Command was the only Marine Corps organization to use an OTA contract for cloud-related work, and it spent all of the shown total on its portion of the Information Warfare Research Project. The Chief of Naval Operations’ spending also went to the Information Warfare Research Project, which was a new start in FY 2022.

Parting Thought

Getting off to a slow start using OTAs may have been good for the Navy and Marines. It provided an opportunity to learn lessons from the Army and Air Force, as well as to train its acquisition personnel in the use of the new authority. Now the Navy is turning to OTA for cloud-related prototypes more than ever before. Even the Marine Corps began getting involved by starting its first project in FY 2022. This trend should continue as the Navy and Marines tackle technical challenges related to using cloud capabilities at the tactical edge and for afloat platforms.