Federal Decision Makers & Trends in Artificial Intelligence (AI) Contracting

Overview of AI Spending by Agency

As the largest purchaser of technology within the federal government, it should be no surprise the DoD is close to 80% of AI spend. Offices such as the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) are critical to AI decision-making at the DoD. What may be surprising is the breadth of other agencies involved. Commerce, DHS, NASA, HHS, VA, and State are key players among the 20 other agencies who have AI-driven spend.

Overview of AI Spending by Office

Looking at the Agency level is great for a high-level view, but if you want to talk to the decision-makers and staff, you need to be at the office level. In just the DoD, there are well over 1,000 key people involved in AI-focused decision-making. There are also over 100 individual offices directly spending on AI.

Click the image below to view an interactive visualization

Overview of AI Vendors

We identified over 200 vendors involved in AI awards with the federal government. These include AI-focused companies, research-focused companies and non-profits, System Integrators, and universities. The Biden Administration has committed funds to research so universities and research organizations should come as no surprise. However, what may be surprising is that the majority of awards are going to traditional System Integrators (almost 50%). Since sub-contracting data is not publicly available, there are likely more AI vendors “working” with the federal government.

Congressional Leaders Shaping Policy & Legislation

AI is clearly a focus area for the administration, but who calls the shots on the Hill? You might think tech and academic centers would dominate policy-making, but that is not the case.

We put together a District Map of where those policy makers reside. Certainly, coastal states dominate, but it’s not all Silicon Valley, Silicon Alley, and other tech centers.

What is notable for policy makers is that the vast majority of sponsors on bills impacting AI are not part of specific committee or caucuses involved in AI.

Leaders and staff comprised a group close to 200 key influencers on the Hill.

Future Updates

As contracts are released and money is spent, we will be closely monitoring the impact of those dollars in AI. Understandably the market is fluid, and we want to be prepared for what the contracting world needs. Please feel free to submit updates or suggestions.

About Our Data

Leadership Connect is the first service to use human-driven research and AI to connect agency leaders & staff to awards and opportunities for government and contractors.  We are also the first to do the same for policy and staff.  We used our database to export awards driven by keyword, known offices, vendors, and NAICS codes to produce a list of awards.  This same search is available in our product.  We did the same in looking at AI-focused entities on the Hill along with legislation to produce a list of leaders who are involved in AI-policy.