The Big-Money Contracts

October. It's the time each year when the leaves turn rich autumn hues, members of Congress scurry to their districts to campaign, the Supreme Court returns to session, and the federal coffers become flush once again with cash.

At the beginning of this federal fiscal year, the Bush administration earmarked more than $64 billion for IT--slightly higher than last year--to be divided fairly evenly between defense and civilian agencies.

Who gets their hands on the most IT money is largely determined by the contracts doled out by several administering agencies.

Many of the most lucrative contracts currently up for grabs reflect changes in how federal customers buy. Agencies are increasingly going their own way, unwilling to rely on the large governmentwide acquisition contracts (GWACs). As a result, more agencies offer their own procurement vehicles--such as the Department of Homeland Security's FirstSource and Enterprise Acquisition Gateway for Leading Edge (EAGLE) programs--to control their own destinies and perhaps distance themselves from the struggling General Services Administration (GSA).

At the same time, the scope of contracts is expanding to better accommodate agencies' need for both products and services.

"Technologies are becoming richer and more tightly woven, and the procurement processes are reflecting that," says Ray Bjorklund, senior vice president and chief knowledge officer at FedSources, a McLean, Va.-based market-intelligence firm.

Inevitably, change brings growing pains. As contracts expand in scope and agencies take on larger roles in their procurement processes, delays in rollouts have become standard. At the same time, a newfound focus on services has led to RFPs that are so broad in scope they unintentionally disqualify many key technologies from consideration.

"[These large services contracts] are painful to participate in, but many times unavoidable to be a player in this market," says Rick Marcotte, president and CEO of DLT Solutions and a member of the GovernmentVAR editorial advisory board. "In many cases, they have a guaranteed volume of zero and are merely expensive 'table stakes' that resellers and systems integrators have to put in place for the privilege of competing for projects down the road."

Such inefficiencies are the nature of government procurement. The challenge for solution providers is figuring out which contracts are actually worth their time. The following 10 contracts prevail as the most sought-after and reviled, while promising some of the largest payouts. Understanding these procurement vehicles is key to capturing a share of that $64 billion pie.