In a statement dated March 3, 2017, the DoD announced the winners of a super-sized, 10-year language services contract. The USD 9.86bn Army contract will be divided among nine companies and run through March 16, 2027.
Winning slots in the framework are ABM Government Services, CALNET, CWU, Global Linguist Solutions, SSI (Mid Atlantic Professionals), Mission Essential, SOS International (SOSi), Valbin, and WorldWide Language Resources.
The contracting authority, the US Army Intelligence and Security Command in Fort Belvoir, Virginia, received 20 bids. The award comprises multiple foreign language support contracts under the program called Defense Language Interpretation Translation Enterprise (DLITE II).
The DLITE II contract will provide interpreting, translating, and transcription services for US Army missions across the globe. Much of it will be “short notice and urgent” and include locations like Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Guantanamo Bay.
According to the Defense Department RFP, contractors are expected to supervise and report on the services they deliver on a daily basis, including costs. It is also desirable for DLITE II contractors to employ linguists with secondary level, mission-related skills like medical, legal, engineering, and military.
Only three of the nine companies awarded are language service providers (LSPs) in the narrow sense — WorldWide Language Resources, Valbin, and Global Linguist Solutions — with the latter two primarily serving the US government.
Contract winners Mission Essential and SOSi started out as LSPs, but have since expanded their focus to serve other government requirements. ABM specializes in facilities management, CALNET in IT and intelligence, CWU in staffing, and SSI in language training.
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Local time: 05:42
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The mentioned language service-provider firms, which were awarded their respective portions of that DLITE II contract, will be very busy in future with finding a new batch of qualified bilinguals and then getting them processed for granting of the required US Government (surmise Dept of Defense/US Army) personnel security clearances and related special access "tickets."
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The mentioned language service-provider firms, which were awarded their respective portions of that DLITE II contract, will be very busy in future with finding a new batch of qualified bilinguals and then getting them processed for granting of the required US Government (surmise Dept of Defense/US Army) personnel security clearances and related special access "tickets."
That clearance process reportedly now takes a minimum of twelve months (longer if the associated "tickets" are involved), according to the already-hardworking Facility Security Officers (FSOs) at a few of those firms.
I mention "growing a new batch" of cleared bilinguals because most of the bilinguals who have previously been processed, cleared and hold active-status clearances, are already employed and unlikely to leave their incentive-loaded present positions. A parallel and considerable factor is that this amendment to DLITE II means an increase in the demand and deployments for cleared linguists (having been one on several occasions to support US Central Command and USSOCOM).
Regards,
Stephen H. Franke
Senior veteran Arabic linguist ▲ Collapse
Local time: 08:42
English to Spanish
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How are competent translators supposed to obtain such a clearance on their own? Answer: it's impossible, you have to be sponsored.
I've been through background checks numerou... See more
How are competent translators supposed to obtain such a clearance on their own? Answer: it's impossible, you have to be sponsored.
I've been through background checks numerous times. Half of the questions, even for a US citizen like myself, are childishly nonsensical. ▲ Collapse
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