HERNDON, Va., Oct. 25, 2004. The U.S. Air Force's Standard Systems Group of Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala. announced in September the award of the NETCENTS Information technology products, solutions, and services contract.

NETCENTS will provide voice, video, and data communications hardware and software as well as networking services to the Air Force.

This $9 billion, five-year contract was awarded to eight groups of contractors. This indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract will replace the Air Force's expired Unified Local Area Network Architecture II, or ULANA II, contract.

In a September 10th service statement, Brig. Gen. Bradley Butler, deputy Air Force CIO commented, "We now have highly flexible contract vehicles in place to cover the entire range of networking and telephony products and services requirements for the Air Force. These vehicles will satisfy virtually any network-centric requirement for our warfighters worldwide."

Contract winners included four groups of large-business partners and four groups of small-business partners. Large business winners included General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin. Small business winners included Telos Corp.

The General Dynamics group includes: Accenture, Boeing, CACI, The Centech Group, GTSI, Harris, Raytheon, Sprint, and Unisys.

The Lockheed Martin group includes: Lucent Technologies; IBM Global Services; Fluor Corp.; SBC Communications; Qwest Communications; Sprint Government Systems; Avaya, Inc.; NextiraOne, LLC.; World Wide Technology, Inc., and Abacus Technology Corp.

The Telos group includes more than 20 partners. One of them is NextiraOne Federal, LLC, which was chosen both by large business partner Lockheed Martin Corp. of Bethesda, Md. and by small business partner Telos Corporation of Ashburn, Va.

NextiraOne Federal's focus for NETCENTS will be providing voice and data converged solutions in support of the Air Force Combat Information Transport System (CITS). The company will provide additional services including installation, maintenance, and on-site project management in both the continental U.S. (CONUS) and outside the continental U.S. (OCONUS) locations around the world.

"We are very excited about this most recent dual award for NETCENTS," commented Stephen Snyder, president of NextiraOne Federal. "We have worked very hard to understand the needs of the Air Force and our federal government clients. We also have a commitment to working with small, disadvantaged and minority-owned businesses, as well as strengthening our relationships with other leading integrators in the federal space. We are reinforcing that commitment with our Lockheed Martin and Telos team wins and are proud to be working with companies of their repute and stature."

NETCENTS has the potential to become the contract of choice for the service for all future acquisitions of IT products, solutions and services.

"Our recent wins for the NETCENTS contract emphasize the depth and breadth NextiraOne Federal possesses as a global systems integrator to the federal government," said Chuck Roth, NextiraOne Federal vice president of sales. "We are very pleased to be working with both Lockheed Martin and Telos and look forward to providing the Air Force with the tools they will need to maintain their worldwide network of warfighters."

NextiraOne Federal is a global Systems Integrator to the federal government. NextiraOne Federal is an established partner in the federal marketplace, offering converged enterprise network solutions with the added benefit of more than 40 years experience in mission- critical communications networking. The company provides best in class, vendor-independent solutions and a full range of services, from consultation, planning and design, through implementation, support, and management of converged networks. NextiraOne Federal is owned by Platinum Equity, a global M&A&O(SM) firm specialized in the merger, acquisition and operation of mission-critical services and solutions companies. For more information, see www.nextiraonefederal.com or www.platinumequity.com.