Comcast wins third piece of DISA's commercial gateway initiative

Comcast has won another portion of the Defense Information Systems Agency’s effort to replace legacy circuits across the U.S. with ethernet connections to help users access the military’s global information network.

DISA awarded a potential 10-year, $84.1 million contract to Comcast for work in the state of Virginia, or Region 4 of the Commercial Ethernet Gateway initiative. The agency received six bids for the award, according to the Defense Department's Monday awards digest.

Work will take place over six-year base term and a pair of two-year option periods.

This award comes within the same month that Comcast was chosen for Gateway Region 3 covering Maryland and Washington, D.C. under a potential $102.8 million award over up to 10 years. Comcast also won Region 1 covering New England last year, which means the telecommunications conglomerate has won three regions to date.

Under the CEG initiative, DISA accesses the same networks provided by commercial telecom services companies and uses those to connect to the main Department of Defense Information Network known as DODIN.

Awards for at least several of the regions have been scheduled to take place throughout this current federal fiscal year, according to a DISA industry forecast on CEG.

(NOTE: This story was updated Tuesday with additional information from DOD's Monday awards digest)