The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has awarded Lumen Technologies a task order worth more than $1.2 billion to deliver a fully integrated wide area data transport service to more than 9,500 USDA locations across the US and around the world.
The contract will see Lumen - previously known as CenturyLink - offer secure remote access, contact center, and cloud connectivity solutions to the USDA sites.
USDA will make use of Lumen's Edge computing architecture to acquire and process data closer to the edge of the network.
“One of America’s largest cabinet agencies chose Lumen to securely modernize its network and IT services. We’re excited to help the USDA benefit from today’s digital technologies that are transforming farming into precision agriculture,” said Zain Ahmed, senior vice president, Lumen public sector.
“Lumen is bringing modern technology solutions that will make it easier for the USDA to accomplish its mission of promoting the production of nutritious food that nourishes our people, providing economic opportunity to rural Americans, and preserving our nation’s natural resources through smart forest and watershed conservation.”
The 11-year task order has an initial term through September 30, 2022, with 10 one-year options, was awarded under the General Services Administration’s 15-year, $50 billion Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) program.
in 2020, Lumen (then CenturyLink) was awarded $1.6 billion under the same EIS program to provide secure network services and IT modernization solutions to the US Department of the Interior, as well as a $470m to provide Wide Area Network services to the US Social Security Administration.
In December, the company was fined $3.8m for failing to prevent or adequately disclose 911 network outages.
