AT&T appears to be the home team network for the homeland. The network operator has landed nearly three dozen contracts with the U.S. federal government since it instituted a massive effort to overhaul the networks that serve agencies and federal employees.

AT&T will later this week announce another major contract win with a U.S. government agency, this time a $725 million contract with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The operator shared details about the win with SDxCentral in advance of the formal news release. 

The 12-year contract calls for AT&T to provide the VA, and the 18 million veterans and families it serves, with an IP-based data network, including support for WAN, virtual private networking, and managed network services. The operator said it will also help the agency modernize its network to converge voice, video, and data services; consolidate its network; and improve network resiliency with elevated security.

AT&T is currently working with the agency to plan and map out the network upgrade project. The VA manages 1,255 health care facilities, including 170 medical centers and 1,074 outpatient centers that serve 9 million veterans each year. 

The modernization effort with AT&T will allow VA care providers to access a veteran’s health care records in almost real time on a connected device, replacing the need for paper-based record sharing and speeding up the delivery of care, according to AT&T.

AT&T has snagged multiple 9-figure contracts with federal agencies this year, including a $175 million contract with the Transportation Department, a $231 million agreement with the Treasury Department, and a $306 million deal with Homeland Security. The operator also snagged a $984 million contract to modernize the U.S. Department of Justice’s communications platforms in 2019, and a $311 million contract with the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration in 2020. 

All of the deals were awarded under the General Services Administration’s Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) technology buying program, which is part of the U.S. government’s $50 billion telecommunications and network modernization initiative. Almost one third of that total $50 billion opportunity has been awarded to date. 

The process, as with most things involving the government, has taken longer than expected. A spokesperson for the GSA recently told Federal News Network that nine of 17 large agencies and 11 of 25 medium agencies have awarded all related contracts. 

However, more than half of all EIS task orders identified to date have been awarded. The GSA, which expects to manage a total of 212 solicitations for EIS bids, has released 164 for bid, and 94 of those have been awarded. AT&T claims it's won almost 40% of EIS deals awarded to date.

AT&T is one of nine vendors approved for the EIS contracts and the operator said it’s still in contention for about 70 task orders yet to be awarded. Some federal agencies are awarding all of their network modernization work to one vendor, but others are spreading the work across multiple vendors. 

AT&T said it is unable to quantify the cumulative total contract value of the EIS contracts it’s won to date.