Australian cybersecurity and network management company FirstWave Cloud Technology recently announced that it has secured another expansion of its partnership with the US space agency NASA.
This is the 4th extension of FirstWave’s relationship with the space agency, with the new agreement also providing the opportunity to grow further over the next 12 months.
The initial contract with NASA was signed by technology group Opmantek Ltd in July 2021 prior to its
acquisition by FirstWave in January 2022. Since that time the agreement has been extended on
several occasions, including a major expansion of the partnership in August 2022.
From an initial contract value of a less than $100,000, the contract could now generate multiple
millions of dollars over its lifetime.
NASA uses FirstWave’s software to monitor the Artemis missions (www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis/).
As part of the program, NASA aims to establish a sustainable presence on the Moon to prepare for
missions to Mars. The first uncrewed mission under the program, Artemis I, was launched in
November last year with Artemis 2 scheduled to be launched in May 2024.
FirstWave CEO Danny Maher said the company was pleased to be part of the Artemis program and
the extension of the contract with NASA reflected the value of the company’s products.
“This is another enhancement of our agreement with NASA, and they have emerged as one of our
most important and valued clients,” he said. “It is a relationship we will continue to foster.”
While the exact nature of how NASA is using FirstWave’s software is secret, it was selected to handle
events in real-time in a mission-critical setting. One of the key features of FirstWave’s solution is the
software’s automated resolution of events which can be applied in any environment.
The primary software modules being utilised by NASA include:
- NMIS – The backbone of a network management system and core for FirstWave’s network
management, monitoring and auditing software modules. - opEvents – Processing the diagnostics of events and leveraging intelligent automation to
remediate issues. - opHA – High availability, automated redundancy, with primary-poller functions and geographic
distribution of the management system to enable optimal functionality.
FirstWave is a leading provider of enterprise-grade network management, automation and IT audit
software, with 150,000 organisations using their software across 178 countries and enterprise clients,
including Microsoft, Telmex, ClaroDR and NASA.
Integrating FirstWave’s CyberCision platform with Opmantek’s flagship Network Management
Information System (NMIS) and Open-AudIT product enables FirstWave to provide a comprehensive
end-to-end solution for network discovery, management and cybersecurity for its partners globally.
