The U.S. Army has awarded a contract worth more than US$152 million to Lockheed Martin Corp. to operate the Army Knowledge Online (AKO) enterprise Web portal.

In an announcement last week, the Army said the portal is used more than half a million times daily by Army personnel.

Under the deal, Computer Sciences Corp. and Science Applications International Corp. will serve as major subcontractors to Lockheed Martin.

AKO provides a secure, single point of entry for official Army business, according to the Army.

Lockheed Martin will provide systems operations and maintenance, network communications, hardware and software integration and round-the-clock help desk support for both the unclassified and secure Army networks, according to the Army.

The contract is for one year, with annual options to extend it for six more years.