Today the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) announced a new approach to scaling data, analytics, and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities called Open DAGIR, which stands for the Open Data and Applications Government-owned Interoperable Repositories. Open DAGIR will be a multi-vendor ecosystem with supporting business models that enables industry and government to integrate data platforms, development tools, services, and applications in a way that preserves government data ownership and industry intellectual property.
"Open DAGIR builds upon the momentum created by the Deputy Secretary of Defense's 2021 Creating Data Advantage memo, which included five data decrees for how the Department would retain ownership of its data while maximizing data sharing," said Dr. Radha Plumb, the CDAO. "Open DAGIR brings the best industry has to offer to the Department. It allows us to ensure enduring access to government-owned, contractor-operated technology stacks and infrastructure and retain data rights while also maximizing the ability of other companies to develop applications with government data."
The Department will initially leverage the Open DAGIR ecosystem to support the data infrastructure and applications that support the Combined Joint All Domain Command and Control (CJADC2). This week, the Department made awards on mission command applications for combatant commands. The first ensures enterprise access to an open, government owned infrastructure with foundational data integrations, mature software deployment tools, and security architecture for government data. The second award is a prototype other transaction award (OTA) to rapidly and securely onboard third-party vendor and government capabilities into the government owned, contractor-operated data environment to meet priority Combatant Command digital needs. CDAO plans to explore similar approaches to enabling enduring access to infrastructure for enterprise analytics and federated tactical data in the future.
To identify solutions to priority warfighter needs, the CDAO will leverage its Global Information Dominance Experiment (GIDE) series to assess and where appropriate select new solutions to add to the Open DAGIR ecosystem. This will begin with an industry day in mid July.
"We want America's best talent solving DoD's hardest problems," Dr. Plumb said. "Open DAGIR ensures the Department can leverage the innovative solutions from the world-class software developers in both the traditional and nontraditional industrial base to create capabilities for our warfighters and decision makers. Combined with our experimentation-based approach to capability development, we aim to give industry front-row access to both our data and our users to develop relevant and timely software for decision advantage."
The CDAO awarded the prototype OTA through its award-winning Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace, which is a digital repository of post competition, readily awardable pitch videos that address the Department of Defense's (DoD) most significant challenges in the AI/ML, data, and analytics space.
All awardable solutions have been assessed through complex scoring rubrics and competitive procedures and are available to Government customers with a Marketplace account at www.tradewindai.com.
About the CDAO
The CDAO is responsible for accelerating the DoD's adoption of data, analytics, and AI, enabling the Department's digital infrastructure and policy adoption to deliver scalable AI-driven solutions for enterprise and joint use cases, safeguarding the nation against current and emerging threats.
For more information about the CDAO, please visit our website at ai.mil. You can also connect with the CDAO on LinkedIn (@ DoD Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office) and X, formally known as Twitter (@dodcdao). Additional updates and news can be found on the CDAO Unit Page on DVIDS.