What is NGEN?
Published, February 14, 2008
NGEN at a Glance:
- The Next Generation Enterprise Network (NGEN) will be the follow-on to the Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI).
- NGEN is the first step towards achieving the Department of the Navy’s future vision of a fully integrated Naval Networking Environment (NNE).
- The NGEN initiative is in the pre-decision phase; requirements are currently being defined and approved.
- The DON has actively engaged with industry and other government agencies to gain lessons learned and best practices.
- The overarching focus of senior leadership is ensuring a seamless transition from NMCI to NGEN, while improving reliability, adaptability, security, governance, and support to the warfighter.
Next Generation Enterprise Network
The DON's Next Generation Enterprise Network is the follow-on to the Navy Marine Corps Intranet, the DON’s current shore-based network and operating environment. NGEN will supply a secure information technology infrastructure for the continental United States and select locations overseas.
The NMCI contract, which presently provides services for the DON, will expire 30 September 2010. Following its implementation, NGEN will deliver information transport services and provide access to core enterprise applications for the warfighter and those who support them. NGEN will provide the foundation for the DON’s future Naval Networking Environment, which is envisioned to be a fully integrated enterprise-wide networking environment where data and services are ubiquitously available to DON users.
DON Enterprise Network Today
NMCI consists of more than 660,000 user accounts at more than 300 bases in the continental United States, Hawaii and Japan, making it the largest intranet in the world. NMCI plays a vital role in information sharing, transmitting 3.4 terabytes of data each day and over 100 million email messages per month. NMCI has significantly increased network security; each month NMCI thwarts 1,200 unclassified intrusion attempts, blocks 9 million spam messages, and detects an average of 60 viruses.
Current Status of the Initiative
The highest levels of Department of the Navy leadership, including the Secretary of the Navy, the Chief of Naval Operations, and the Commandant of the Marine Corps, are actively engaged and guiding the NGEN initiative. DON leadership is focused on ensuring a seamless transition from the NMCI environment to the NGEN environment. To accomplish this, the Department is leveraging lessons learned from NMCI and other government and industry organizations that operate large enterprise-wide networks. The Government anticipates using several methods to obtain industry participation and enable communication prior to release of the formal Request for Proposal. Future opportunities will be announced via Federal Business Opportunities.
The NGEN initiative is currently identifying and developing the requirements. Planning for acquisition, contracting, and transition is underway and will be finalized as elements of the requirements are approved. Legacy network reduction, in preparation for NGEN, is ongoing and will continue to streamline the Navy/ Marine Corps IT infrastructure.
User Focus
With its focus on improved reliability, adaptability, and security, NGEN will ultimately ensure that users have timely access to the information and services necessary to accomplish their missions and functions. NGEN is the next step to the formative transition of the Department’s NNE, which will eventually provide a robust information system with the capabilities required by the warfighter and those who support the warfighter.