PODCAST: General Dynamics IT talks government 5G, edge technology coalition

Dec. 16, 2022
The Cabling Podcast sits down for an instructive chat with Rob Smallwood, vice president of digital modernization, and Shuaib Porjosh, director for advanced wireless. for General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT), a business unit of General Dynamics.

The Cabling Podcast recently sat down with Rob Smallwood, vice president of digital modernization, and Shuaib Porjosh, director for advanced wireless, for General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT), a business unit of General Dynamics (NYSE:GD), to learn more about GDIT's recently announced formation of a coalition with leading U.S. technology and telecommunications conglomerates.

Including the likes of Amazon Web Services (AWS), Cisco, Dell Technologies, Splunk and T-Mobile, the GDIT coalition's mandate is to accelerate the adoption of 5G advanced wireless and edge technologies across government agencies.

During the interview, Smallwood and Porjosh describe GDIT's foundational Advanced Wireless Emerge Lab and how it operates. We learn how the GDIT coalition is developing technology solutions that will support federal, state and local agencies' unique mission requirements from the enterprise to the edge in a wide variety of applications, including military, logistics and supply chain, healthcare, education and smart infrastructure.

In the podcast, CI&M probes the background of the GDIT coalition's development, and asks whether uniform adoption of 5G and edge technologies has been a challenge in government facilities, or whether the advancements in AI/sensor tech for buildings are such that a technology coalition such as GDIT is now required for federal customers.

CI&M also inquires to what degree the coalition could be involved in physical deployment, installation, maintenance, and monitoring of developed technology solutions, and what the roadmap will be for the rollout of technology solutions developed by the GDIT coalition.

Other questions from CI&M for the GDIT experts include: How many government contractors might be deploying the new technology, and will it be a select group? And for organizations planning to use 5G to enhance logistics/manufacturing/supply chain processes, with supply chains very much in the news today, what can organizations can do now, in terms of deploying 5G, to improve their long-term supply chain operations?