Last week’s passage of an omnibus spending bill eliminated the threat of a full-year continuing resolution and gave the Defense budget a nearly 4.7% spending increase. But lawmakers were less generous when it came to the matter of expanding a program meant to test major reforms to how DoD funds technology modernization.
The final agreement rejected the Pentagon’s request to significantly expand what’s known as the Software and Digital Technology Pilot Program in 2022. The pilot, in short, lets major IT programs fund development using a single “color of money,” rather than trying to wedge their budgets into the R&D, procurement and operations accounts that were originally designed for major weapons systems.
