The US military’s DISN backbone uses bulk-rate leased, high-speed transmission mediums (T1 and T3 channels) and GFE smart (computerized) multiplexers which provide advance dynamic bandwidth allocation services. In addition to cost savings over equivalent commercial grade services, DISN circuits provide customers a specialized 24/7 network control center for monitoring and trouble reporting activated DISN circuits.
MCI Telecommunications Corp. (doing business as Verizon) recently received a $6.6 million indefinite-delivery/ indefinite-quantity contract, which will be funded using defense working capital funds. This modification is based on firm-fixed pricing to extend the DISN Switched/Bandwidth Manager Services – CONUS (DS/BMS-C) contract to February 27, 2007. The DS/BMS-C contract needs to remain in place until the completion of transition of all circuits to the new DISN transmission services – CONUS access optimization (DTS-C A/O) contract, which will be used to move approximately 3,200 circuits off of the 35 MCI bandwidth managers to AT&T owned aggregation nodes (see PDF announcement). The requirement was solicited as other than full and open competition basis, and only one proposal was received. The Defense Information Technology Contracting Organization at Scott Air Force Base, IL issued the contract (DCA200-96-D-0096). Note that CONUS = CONtinental United States.