US Defense Department cancels the $10 billion JEDI contract with Microsoft and will re-bid

The full name of JEDI is Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure. It is a 10-year cloud computing project valued at US$10 billion. With the development of cloud computing services, the US Department of Defense hopes to transfer its computing capabilities to the cloud and build related service facilities. Microsoft defeated Amazon in October 2019 and won a major contract from the U.S. Department of Defense. This caused dissatisfaction with Amazon, who believed that the then U.S. President Trump’s prejudice against Amazon and Bezos led the U.S. Department of Defense to favor Microsoft, and he immediately filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Federal Court. Last year, the Attorney General of the U.S. Department of Defense submitted a report stating that the U.S. Department of Defense was not affected in the bidding process for the JEDI project.

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Then the US Department of Defense announced a new project called JWCC (Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability), which can provide many services in the JEDI project. It lasts for 5 years and said that Microsoft and Amazon are the only two companies that can meet the requirements of the Ministry of Defense. If there are other cloud service providers that meet the standards, they will be contacted in the next three months. It is understood that other potential cloud service providers also include Oracle, Google, and IBM to participate.

Relevant people pointed out that it is unreasonable to choose a single supplier to complete a large project like the JEDI project, and there will be potential risks. It is expected that both Microsoft and Amazon will get a contract for the JWCC project to complete the project together, while Oracle, Google, and IBM may participate in some of the projects.