Defense it spending on downslope: information technology.

• Author: Mccoy, Lloyd

With the defense budget under growing pressure, the Pentagon's chief information officer and budget leaders are looking at information technology as a way to do more with less.

Funding for IT is being reduced by 2 percent in fiscal year 2015 from a year ago. Interoperability, infrastructure consolidation and cyber improvements are topping the Defense Department IT wish lists.

The five biggest Defense Department info-tech budgets for 2015 include:

* Air Force: $6.41 billion (a 2.7 percent increase from 2014)

* Defense Health Agency: $2.02 billion (a 9.1 percent increase from 2014)

* Army: $7.91 billion (down 7.3 percent from 2014)

* Navy/Marine Corps: $6.73 billion (a decrease of 6.8 percent from 2014)

* Defense Information Systems Agency: $3.13 billion (down 4.8 percent from 2014)

Industry should not panic, however. The reductions in the Pentagon's information technology budget reflect successful efficiency efforts within the department more so than outright cutbacks.

The Army is experiencing the most visible, if not the biggest, impact of the post-war drawdown. Tomorrow's Army will be smaller and more U.S. based. Units will expect to train with cutting edge technologies. As a result, the Army's IT priorities for 2015 emphasize network modernization.

The Army is looking for technologies that are more mature and less risky have architectures that allow for easy procurement or fielding, and can also be sustained while keeping in mind timeline and financial constraints. Planned Army IT activities for 2015 include: consolidating security stacks and increasing bandwidth at Army installations; implementing a "single sign-on" capability for systems and data; improving controlled access to data stores; increasing visibility of the Army's IT assets; making communication available anywhere and anytime through a single device; and centralizing network operations.

With a fleet that will be shrinking, the Navy and Marine Corps are looking at ways to maximize their punch by increasing interoperability among vessels and strengthening cyber security. The Navy's biggest projects over the next fiscal year will be consolidating its land- and afloat-based networks.

As the Navy and Marine Corps rebalance their strategy toward the Pacific theater, they are centering their IT acquisition strategy on four goals: cost avoidance; protecting sensitive information; fielding a capable cyber space workforce; and improving transparency of IT investments.

Planned...