Telos to upgrade Air Force messaging system

Telos Corp. will provide technical and program management assistance for the Air Force's Defense Message System, which is used throughout the Defense Department. The three-year award could be worth more than $6.3 million.

The Ashburn, Va., company will provide workstation operation services, directory service management, help desk and other administrative functions to the DMS Program Management Office, 754th Electronic Systems Group's Directorate of Operations, at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.

DMS was developed to replace the much slower Automatic Digital Network, known as Autodin. It is a post-World War II era messaging system that transmitted data electronically through a series of military switching centers.

The second generation of DMS, the Xacta Automated Message Handling System, is a Web-based application used by the Air Force to simplify configuration management, systems administration and the customer interface to the DOD record messaging system.

The task order was awarded through the Air Force's Network-centric contract vehicle.