Angela Styles Interviewed by Government Matters on GSA-DOD Collaboration

Akin Gump government contracts partner Angela Styles was interviewed on the Government Matters TV show on prospects for collaboration between the U.S. federal government’s General Services Administration (GSA) and the Department of Defense (DOD).

Among the topics covered:

• What will keep the GSA/DOD collaboration going in the new administration? “You’ve got to have good political leadership that really understands how important it is for DOD and GSA to work together on procurement policy issues.”
• State of play for GSA’s and DOD’s relationship: “Historically, the Department of Defense has really driven procurement policy…GSA has played a secondary role. But now with GSA having such strong leadership and such good relationships with the Department of Defense and with OMB [Office of Management and Budget] and the Office of Federal Procurement Policy, it really has been an excellent change for federal procurement both in terms of transparency, contract vehicles, openness and leadership.”
• Cybersecurity requirements for the vendor base serving DOD: “The Department of Defense finally realized that there’s a lot of prime contractors and subcontractors out there that weren’t following the requirements to actually perform a basic cyber-assessment. And, so, they really are giving them some leeway for a period of time leading up to CMMC [Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification]. CMMC doesn’t affect that many contractors, but the vast majority of contractors will receive controlled unclassified information and will have to have some level of cybersecurity requirements in place.”

To watch the full interview, click here.