Empower AI’s $145.6M DIGIT XGen Win: What It Means for GovCon
In 2021, GSA’s flagship enterprise IT program carried a $807 million price tag. Its next-generation successor, awarded on July 14, 2026, is worth $145.6 million. That gap is not a typo. It is one of the clearest signals yet of where federal IT contracting is heading, and most coverage of the award skipped right past […]
OASIS+ Amendment 0009: July 15 Deadline and What Changed
One signature could decide whether your OASIS+ proposal stays in the running. On July 7, 2026, the General Services Administration (GSA) posted Amendment 0009 for the OASIS+ Phase II solicitations. The amendment applies to all six contract tracks, from 8(a) to Unrestricted. Two things happened at once here. First, offerors with pending proposals received a hard […]
CMMC Phase II Suspended: What Defense Contractors Must Know
More than 100,000 small defense businesses needed a third-party cybersecurity assessment by November 2026. Only about 100 approved assessors existed to perform them. That gap just forced one of the biggest compliance reversals in recent defense contracting history. On July 13, 2026, the Department of War announced the immediate suspension of CMMC Phase II requirements. The same […]
Will AI Replace Government Contractors? The 2026 Reality
Paste a solicitation into an AI tool today, and you can have a clean, professional-looking proposal draft before lunch. That reality has a lot of people asking the same question: Will AI replace government contractors, consultants, and proposal writers in 2026? The short answer is no. The longer answer matters more because AI is genuinely […]
The VA Just Told Its Tech Vendors: Loyalty Doesn’t Pay the Bills Anymore
For years, holding a VA contract felt like job security. You did the work, you stayed out of trouble, and the recompete was mostly yours to lose. That assumption just took a public hit. On June 18, 2026, a senior VA technology official said the quiet part out loud. Zack Schwartz, principal deputy assistant secretary […]
SEWP VI Awards Are Out: What Every Contractor Should Do Next
After years of anticipation, NASA has started handing out one of the federal government’s biggest IT contracts. On June 22, 2026, the agency announced it would begin processing awards for SEWP VI, naming 1,490 vendors and making 2,115 awards across three categories. That scale is hard to overstate. Under the prior SEWP V, NASA made […]
Trusted Workforce 2.0 in 2026: How Continuous Vetting Is Reshaping Cleared Recruitment for Federal Contractors
For decades, security clearance was a snapshot. The government investigated you, granted access, then waited five or ten years to look again. Trusted Workforce 2.0 ended that model. Now the government checks cleared people continuously, all year, every year. This shift matters for anyone who hires cleared talent. By September 2024, the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency […]
The FY2026 NDAA Just Made It Easier to Win Defence Work
For years, small businesses watched defense contracts slip past them. The paperwork was heavy. The cost rules were confusing. And without a track record of past federal work, breaking in felt almost impossible. That just changed. On December 18, 2025, the President signed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026 into law. The […]
Stop Fighting for Scraps: 7 High-Demand Industries for Your First GovCon Win
Many beginners in federal contracting fail not because of a lack of effort, but because they choose industries that are too competitive, too slow, or require past performance; they simply don’t have it yet. Success is about strategy, which means positioning your business where demand is high, but the competition is manageable. By focusing on these seven accessible […]
CMMC Rev 3 Compliance in 2026: What Defense Contractors Must Know Before It’s Too Late
If you hold a DoD contract or want one, your cybersecurity posture is now a legal requirement, not a checkbox to exercise. CMMC Rev 3 compliance is live. The phased rollout is already in motion, and November 2026 is the date most contractors handling Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) will stop being able to self-certify. After that, you’ll need a third-party […]