The US Army selected Acentia as the technical Integrator for its Enterprise Active Directory (EAD) Consolidation, migration of over 1.1M users, workstations, and applications worldwide to provide the warfighter with seamless access globally to business and warfighter mission-area applications.

Acentia is the Technical Integrator for the U.S. Army’s Enterprise Active Directory (EAD) Consolidation and is the key member of the FCI Team, winning the small business set-aside contract in October 2010. We are responsible for the Microsoft Active Directory design, analysis, implementation, and migration of over 1.1M users, workstations, and applications worldwide consisting of approximately 300 sites of both the NIPRnet (unclassified) and SIPRnet (classified). This is the largest Federal Microsoft migration ever. Our team on the project consists of Gus Cata (Program Manager), Mike Funk (Technical Lead), Tae Lim (Systems Engineer), Jason Berg (Systems Engineer), and Mike Kline (Sr. AD Engineer). The team is supported by an important partner, CBFive, a company of highly-trained Microsoft Engineers: Tad Crandall (Microsoft AD Master); Rich Crandall (Microsoft AD Master); and Justin Kraft (Systems Engineer). The team is also supported from a surge capacity by the Enterprise Solutions Group; including Chris Chroniger and Wayne Saxe.

The goal of EAD is to provide the warfighter with seamless access globally to business and warfighter mission area applications. EAD is the first step in the Army’s Information Technology (IT) Transformation called the “Global Network Construct” (GNEC), which is intended to significantly drive down the IT costs for the Army. GNEC also encompasses programs providing Enterprise Email, Enterprise Identity Management, Data Center Consolidation, and IT Asset visibility across the entire Army network. The schedule is very aggressive and the program is briefed on a weekly basis to the Vice Chief of the Army, General Chairelli. The team recently completed the Design Review of the Army’s proposed Enterprise Design and recommended design changes based on Industry Best Practices and our Federal agency Active Directory experience.

The team has completed over 300 site surveys. The next major step will be to procure and install the 600-plus Domain Name Controllers for all sites. In the Option year, starting October 2011, the team will begin migrating all of the sites to the new EAD structure.

Congratulations to the entire EAD Team for its successful work on this important project—a mission critical initiative that directly supports our warfighters. We are pleased that we are trusted to lead this very large, complex architectural design and deployment project.