Appian to open the way into DKO portal

Northrop Grumman Corp. has selected Appian Corp. to provide enterprise portal technology and process-based services on a $267 million Army task order under the Air Force Network-Centric Solutions contract to develop Defense Knowledge Online.

DKO is designed to be a secure service-oriented entry point for all Defense Department and other authorized users to access DOD and agencies' intranets that support operations, missions and critical processes for soldiers and other government users.

Appian's technology will help the DKO enterprise solution grow from 1.8 million users to 8 million or more, potentially across all federal government agencies.

"DKO promises to provide all warfighters with access to the information they need to do their jobs better and complete their missions," said Matt Calkins, chief executive officer of Appian.

The DKO task order is one year with four six-month options. Initial work will be performed at Fort Belvoir, Va., at an undisclosed site in Maryland, and in southwest Asia.

Northrop Grumman, of Los Angeles, has 125,000 employees worldwide. The company ranks No. 2 on Washington Technology's 2006 Top 100 list of the largest federal IT contractors.