DataStream

American Management Systems officials are trying to persuade the Mississippi State Tax Commission to drop a lawsuit seeking nearly $1 billion in compensatory and punitive damages for an automated revenue system.

The commission, which charged that AMS failed to develop and implement the system as required by the contract, terminated the effort late last month. AMS officials contend they still can deliver the $11.2 million system they agreed to build under a 1993 contract.

"We intend to meet our obligations and intend to hold them to theirs," said Ross Kory, vice president and director of state and local government and education for Fairfax, Va.-based AMS. Mississippi's Tax Commission terminated the contract April 22, just 10 days before the first of four major components in the new revenue system was scheduled to go live.

"We really had no inkling that this result was on the horizon," said Kory. AMS will contest the lawsuit if it cannot resolve the dispute with the state and the commission, officials said.
The General Services Administration recently awarded 12 prime contractors the right to compete for future business under its mammoth $25 billion Millennia contract.

The 10-year contract is the largest IT Solutions contract ever issued by the GSA's Federal Technology Services division. Any government agency can purchase a broad range of IT services through Millennia.

The winners are Boeing Information Services Inc., Booz-Allen & Hamilton Inc., Computer Sciences Corp., DynCorp I & ET Inc., Lockheed Martin Services Inc., Logicon Inc., OAO Corp., PRC Inc., Raytheon Technical Services Co., Science Applications International Corp., Systems Research and Applications Corp. and Unisys Corp.



ManTech International Corp. of Fairfax, Va., continued its acquisition march with the purchase of Revive Technologies Inc. of Pittsburgh. Terms of the May 4 deal were not disclosed.

Revive specializes in automated conversion of legacy mainframe databases. It has 28 employees and will become part of ManTech Systems Solutions division.

The deal is the seventh by the private company in the last two years.

Motorola Worldwide Information Network Services, a division of Motorola Corp. of Schaumburg, Ill., has won a contract worth up to $52 million from the General Services Administration to provide satellite communication products and Iridium services to federal agencies.

The government has been an early user of Iridium, the worldwide satellite telephone system that has battled technical glitches and distribution problems since beginning operations last November.

The Defense Information Systems Agency recently awarded Motorola a $219 million contract for Iridium services. Motorola was the prime contractor and is the main investor behind Iridium.
Bell Microproducts of San Jose, Calif., has reached an agreement to sell Quadras, its contract manufacturing operation, for more than $30 million to Pemstar Inc. of Rochester, Minn.

The sale, expected to close in early June, is part of a move to help Bell focus on its core business of distributing storage products and other electronic components to government and commercial resellers.

Last year, Quadras had sales of $86 million, 15 percent of Bell's $575 million in total revenue.

Keane Inc. of Boston has acquired the privately held management consulting company Amherst Consulting Group Inc. for an undisclosed sum.

The Boston company will be folded into Keane's Bricker & Associates consulting group and should strengthen Keane's management consulting practice. It is part of Keane's move to expand the presence of its Chicago-based Bricker & Associates group into the Boston area.


Most senators and representatives use their Web sites for self-promotion rather than to give constituents access to the information and services they want, according to a study of congressional Web sites.

These lawmakers "do not yet seem to understand the unique potential of a Web site," said the report, "Building Web Sites Constituents Will Use." it was released May 3 by the non-profit Congressional Management Foundation in Washington.

The report advised lawmakers to "let go of the notion that the Web is the same as a television appearance or targeted mailing, and start letting your audience, rather than your agenda, dictate your content."
Electronic Data Systems Corp.'s Government Industry Group will not be dramatically affected by the May 3 restructuring announced by Dick Brown, the company's new chief executive.

That is because the Herndon, Va., government unit went through a realignment several months ago that fits the direction Brown wants to take the rest of the company, said Randy Dove, EDS spokesman.

EDS plans to reorganize along geographic lines and has formed an e-Business Solutions unit in an attempt to improve the system integrator's performance. Brown said he will not be satisfied until "we regain our leadership position in the industry we founded."

On April 29, Brown announced first quarter results at an analysts meeting in New York, calling 1999 a transitional year. EDS said restructuring costs caused a first quarter net loss of $20.6 million.

The company has made more than 5,000 layoffs, of which less than 100 are in the greater Washington area. EDS said it saw a first quarter net profit of $181.8 million before the one-time charges of letting go 5,200 of its 110,000 employees and discontinuing some operations.