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PARSIPPANY, NJ – March 14, 2007. CherryRoad Group Inc., a full-service systems integrator, today announced that its government division, CherryRoad GT Inc., is partnering with Northrop Grumman Corporation to support Defense Knowledge Online (DKO), a DoD program managed by the Program Executive Office, Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS) of the U.S. Army.
DKO is a knowledge based portal that includes collaboration and messaging services for the Department of Defense, branches of the military, and potentially across all Federal government agencies, creating the largest system of its kind with up to 8 million projected users. Northrop Grumman Corporation won the task order with a $267 million ceiling under the NETCENTS, an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract. The length of the DKO task order is one year with four six-month options. Initial work will be performed at Fort Belvoir, V.A., an undisclosed site, and in southwest Asia.
Under the partnership, CherryRoad GT will provide operations and maintenance services, including: portal software integration, data center management, managed hosting, information assurance, physical security, helpdesk services, asset management and acquisition services.
Since 1998, CherryRoad GT has been the prime contractor for the Army Knowledge Online (AKO) program, chosen by the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) as the model for DKO. DISA selected AKO as the best of breed portal within the DoD. In 2002, CherryRoad GT collaborated with Northrop Grumman for AKO disaster recovery architecture and support services. CherryRoad GT has also teamed with Appian for DKO portal and BPM software integration and maintenance, the second such collaboration between the two firms. DISA anticipates that DKO will eventually subsume the AKO user community and the user communities of other branch service portals.
"CherryRoad GT and Northrop Grumman have a strong track record of successful collaboration on programs such as AKO and the Defense Integrated Military Human Resources System (DIMHRS). It is a privilege to be a member of the Northrop Grumman IT team as it takes on the largest DoD enterprise portal implementation ever conducted," said Tom Ferrando, president and chief operating officer of CherryRoad Group. "Our more than 23 years of enterprise software implementation experience, our longtime collaboration with the U.S. Army on the Army Knowledge Online portal and other initiatives, position us to successfully contribute to this team effort," he added.
When it is completed, DKO may serve up to 8 million active, retired, reserve, civilian, contractor, and National Guard service members from all military branches, as well as the family members of deployed military personnel. It will provide collaboration services, applications, and messaging services such as email, chat, instant messaging, search tools, and enterprise directory services.
"DKO is the largest enterprise service portal undertaking by any organization to date", stated Curt Mattingly, vice president of CherryRoad GT. "The challenge for our team is to translate the talent, lessons learned, and experience of our AKO program team, and our company, into the long-term success of DKO. In many ways, we've been preparing for this challenge since 1998 with AKO and we look forward to building upon that success with our partners, Northrop Grumman, the Department of Defense, and the military branches".
About CherryRoad Group
CherryRoad Group provides comprehensive systems integration and consulting services that achieve breakthrough results for industry and government, through CherryRoad GT, the government division, and CherryRoad Technologies, the commercial division. CherryRoad Group has more than 400 customers, including the U.S. Army; The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; Atlantic Health System; the Board of Pensions of the Presbyterian Church, USA; City of Pasadena; Hampton Roads Transit; Malcolm Pirnie; Mercedes-Benz; MetLife; National Exchange Carrier Association; the New York Public Library; Philadelphia Housing Authority; Port of Seattle; Twentieth Century Fox; Visiting Nurse Service of New York; and XL Capital. CherryRoad Group has nearly 400 employees and is based in Parsippany, N.J. with offices throughout the United States.