“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt
As we are just over three months into the 2019 federal government fiscal year, it’s easy to feel a lack of optimism or confidence in the future. Every time you turn on the news, the airwaves are filled with political dysfunction and negativity. The divide and power struggle between political parties is at an all-time low, and we’re now in the midst of the longest government shutdown in the history of our country. Not to mention the additional struggles of ongoing international trade wars, Brexit drama, instability in the Middle East, and of course the never-ending and exhausting Mueller investigation.
However, there is reason for optimism despite all of the bipartisan theater. In stark contrast to our broken political system, the US economy has been booming. The glass is half full perspective would reveal that technology and innovation are driving us all forward into an exciting future. According to a recent article in Bloomberg Businessweek, “Annualized growth rates in the two middle quarters of 2018 were 4.2 percent and 3.5 percent. In October alone, the economy generated 250,000 jobs.” (read full Bloomberg article HERE) Good news for government contractors, according to Bloomberg Government: “Contract spending has grown by almost 6 percent per year over the past five years as federal agencies relied increasingly on government-wide contract vehicles and simplified acquisition procedures.… and federal spending on small businesses has risen in lockstep with overall contract spending.” (read the full article HERE). On the technology front, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and the Internet of things (IoT) are becoming more widely adopted and starting to produce real tangible results. There are several applications of these technologies in the business world involving customer service, supply chain, operational efficiencies, forecasting, and much more that are driving revolutionary changes.
Here are some helpful tips and trends to be aware of as we navigate the new year:
“A Contractor’s Guide to Surviving a Government Shutdown”, by Thomas Marcinko at Aronson LLC
– “The ramifications of a government shutdown are difficult to predict. What can be predicted is that a shutdown will adversely affect government contracting. Someone may “win” this game of brinkmanship, but regardless of political orientation, most government contractors, contractor employees, and the important government programs that they support will suffer.” Read More >
“National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019 Includes Acquisition Reforms That Contractors Should Be Aware Of” – Wiley Rein LLP
– “Although the NDAA does not include sweeping acquisition reforms, it does include several provisions that will directly affect contractors. These changes include placing additional limits on sole-source and lowest price technically acceptable (LPTA) contracting, revising the definition of “commercial item” to separately address products and services, requiring additional justifications and approvals for exercising multi-year contract authority or withholding consent to subcontract, directing full and open competition for the forthcoming GSA e-Commerce Portal, and providing exceptions for price competition in the award of indefinite-delivery indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contracts.” Read More >
Will 2019 be the year voice recognition goes mainstream in ERP software?
– “We are on the verge of accessing enterprise data through voice where you can ask a question in basic spoken language and have a platform retrieve the answers — all integrated within enterprise applications. So, within Slack, you could ask, ‘What are Germany unit sales trends?’ and immediately receive back the charts and data.”
- With Acumatica Cloud ERP, Alexa Dons a Business Suit
- Oracle aims to put voice interfaces on Fusion ERP, HCM apps
- 12 Exciting Ways You Can Use Voice-Activated Technology In The Workplace
2019 Trends in ERP
– “The companies that are the most competitive and have the best chance for long-term survival are able to build and maintain a business strategy that can adapt to changing business and technology conditions. The modern business platform has a technology or digital core that supports the ability to build and adapt a digitally enabled business model.” – Michael Fauscette, G2Crowd
Cybersecurity continues to be a top priority in 2019
– “According to the research report, there has been a 100% increase in the number of publicly available exploits for SAP and Oracle ERP applications in the past three years and a 160% increase in the activity and interest in ERP-specific vulnerabilities from 2016 to 2017.” Read More >
GovTribe: A Powerful Tool For Winning Government Contracts and Grants
– “GovTribe has the information you need about federal contracting and grant-making in one, easily searchable website. We pull in data from multiple federal government data sources, organize and integrate the data, and make it easy to find actionable intelligence about federal contracts and grants. This means smart technology that is built for the user with affordable and transparent pricing.” Read More >
Business Systems Compliance in 2019
– According to Robert Craig at Capital Edge Consulting: “The DCAA indicated recently an initiative to significantly increase contractor business system audits in 2019, which includes doubling the number of Accounting System audits performed in 2018.” LinkedIn Post >
2018: Year of the JEDI
– “When 2018 started, we knew very little about the Department of Defense’s landmark plan to acquire enterprise-wide commercial cloud services — but as the year ends, the $10 billion, single-award cloud contract known as JEDI has become the biggest turf war in the federal IT contracting community, one that may forever change the government cloud landscape.” Read More >
Continue to follow the JAMIS Prime Insights Blog for regular updates on government contracting, technology trends, regulatory compliance issues, and other related discussion topics. To find out more about JAMIS Prime ERP, our application built for government contractors, contact us at info@jamis.com or visit our website at www.jamis.com.
