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Cost Estimating NewsBrief: June 6, 2025
Bill to overhaul federal software buying gets another shot in the Senate
(FedScoop) Congress has better agency software buying practices in its sights once again, with a bipartisan group of six senators reintroducing a bill Wednesday that would strengthen federal oversight and management of such purchases. The Strengthening Agency Management and Oversight of Software Assets (SAMOSA) Act, which would require independent assessments of federal software licensing agreements and call on agencies to develop cost-savings plans, has been a priority for tech-minded lawmakers and top IT and software trade groups for most of this decade. Read More
DOD Fraud Risk Management: DOD Should Expeditiously and Effectively Implement Fraud Risk Management Leading Practices
(U.S. Government Accountability Office) We testified about the Department of Defense’s efforts to reduce the risk of fraud. The scale and scope of its spending—including about $445 billion pledged in FY 2024 to contracts for new weapons, support services, and more—make it susceptible. However, DOD lacks a robust fraud risk management program, and its leadership hasn’t shown a strong commitment to this issue. As a result, we recently expanded DOD’s financial management area on our High Risk List to include fraud risk management. DOD has taken initial steps to implement a department-wide fraud risk management program, but it needs to do more to prevent, detect, and respond to fraud. Read More
Chief Information Officer Open Recommendations: Department of Defense
(U.S. Government Accountability Office) In May 2025, GAO identified 54 open recommendations under the purview of the Department of Defense’s (DOD) Chief Information Officer (CIO), including seven that are directed to component-level CIOs, from previously issued work. Each of these recommendations relates to a GAO High-Risk area: (1) Ensuring the Cybersecurity of the Nation, (2) Improving IT Acquisitions and Management, (3) DOD Business Systems Modernization, and (4) DOD Financial Management. In addition, GAO has designated four of the 53 as priority recommendations. Read More
Trump budget wants agencies to contribute unobligated funds to TMF
(NextGov/FCW) The Trump administration is proposing major changes for how the Technology Modernization Fund gets its money in its 2026 budget request. Congress set up the revolving fund in 2017 to finance multi-year tech projects outside of the often-fickle annual appropriations process. TMF thus far has awarded over $1.07 billion across 69 investments and 34 agencies. The administration isn’t asking for any new funding for the TMF, according to budget documents for the General Services Administration — which houses the fund — but it wants lawmakers to pass a new tool for GSA to take money from other agencies to put into the TMF, up to $100 million annually. Read More
Lawmakers want timelines, clarity on Army Transformation Initiative
(Federal News Network) The Army has yet to provide Congress with formal details about its sweeping transformation initiative, more than a month after publicly announcing the effort. “Today, we kick off our review of the administration’s fiscal 2026 budget request for the Department of Defense with the U.S. Army. Unfortunately, we still have not received any real information about that budget request, nor have we received any detailed information on the Army’s Transformation Initiative, or ATI,” Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said during a June 4 budget hearing. Read More
Revolutionary’ FAR Rewrite Will Take Time to Adjust to, GSA Says
(FedWeek) The ongoing rewrite of the Federal Acquisition Regulation “isn’t about abandoning rules or throwing caution to the wind,” the GSA has said, while adding that “there will be an adjustment period, and it might be uncomfortable.” “For the first time, the FAR is being comprehensively overhauled. It is being pared back to its statutory foundation and rewritten in plain language. Many of the one-off rules and procedural add-ons will move out of the regulation and into flexible, practical guides,” it said. Read More
Huge planet discovered orbiting tiny star puzzles scientists
(Space Daily) Astronomers announced Wednesday they have discovered a massive planet orbiting a tiny star, a bizarre pairing that has stumped scientists. Most of the stars across the Milky Way are small red dwarfs like TOI-6894, which has only 20 percent the mass of our Sun. It had not been thought possible that such puny, weak stars could provide the conditions needed to form and host huge planets. But an international team of astronomers have detected the unmistakable signature of a gas giant planet orbiting the undersized TOI-6894, according to a study in the journal Nature Astronomy. Read More
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