What these 5 hot federal contracts say about today's market

Business is still getting done across the federal market amid all the cutbacks, canceled contracts and reductions in the federal workforce.

Our sibling organization GovTribe publishes a list each week of the most popular contract opportunities on their platform. Popularity is based on page views.

For this week, the top five are:

• Central Command Headquarters IDIQ for Professional Services
• Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency IDIQ
• Army Mission and Installation Contracting Command IT Services Support
• Marine Force Pacific Project Dynamis
• Navy Air Systems Command Naval Introductory Flight Evaluation program

They represent a range of solutions and services as expected. But I also wanted to look at what these popular opportunities say about the current state of the market.

Here’s what I found:

A focus on cybersecurity and digital modernization

Both the CISA IDIQ and the Army IT services contracts emphasize cybersecurity, which solicitation documents describe as going hand-in-hand with modernization. For example, the Army Mission and Installation Contracting Command is pushing an enterprise approach to IT and data management.

CISA’s contract is the successor to CDM DEFEND, a government-wide effort to secure civilian networks. The new contract will emphasize program management support, capability implementation, operations and solution development.

Command and Control Integration

Project Dynamis is the Marine Corps' contribution to Project Overmatch, which Navy describes as its role in the Joint All-Domain Command and Control initiative that all of the branches are participating in.

This opportunity is in the pre-solicitation and market research phase. The Marines are trying to identify potential contractors across 11 technical areas: networks and communications, cloud and edge computing, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, autonomous systems, electronic warfare, quantum technologies, logistics, and modeling and simulation.

Project Dynamis is a great name by the way.

Professional Services v. Hardware

These five opportunities are heavy with professional services over hardware, indicating that expertise and knowledge remain critical in today’s market. Those traits actually could be called paramount too.

The Dominance of IDIQs

Indefinite delivery, Indefinite quantity contracts are not a new phenomenon by any stretch. Having three out of five contracts on the list says that government buyers want flexibility, especially in an uncertain environment.

Small Business Engagement

Much is still to be settled with the Trump administration’s small business strategy, but it also is notable that three of the five opportunities are set aside for small businesses.

The Naval Introductory Flight Evaluation and CHIPS contracts are both set aside for service-disabled, veteran-owned small businesses. The Army IT services contract is a competition among 8(a) small businesses.

Collectively, these opportunities indicate that contractors want longer-term relationships with their customers and an opportunity to demonstrate skills in emerging areas such as cybersecurity and multi-domain operations.

Those remain crucial to customer needs. Customers are also looking for stability and flexibility in their vehicles.