The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has awarded Palantir Technologies Inc. a five-year blanket purchase to expand the department’s use of artificial intelligence and large-scale data analytics platforms across its agencies.

The agreement, which is valued at up to $1 billion, allows multiple DHS agencies to acquire Palantir platforms without initiating separate competitive contracts for each deployment. The blanket purchasing agreement deal establishes pre-approved pricing and terms, with funding distributed through individual task orders over the five-year period rather than as a single upfront award.

Palantir’s Gotham and Foundry platforms are expected to form the technical backbone of the deployments.

The Gotham platform is used in government and defense contexts to integrate, analyze and visualize large volumes of structured and unstructured data. The Foundry platform provides data integration, workflow management and operational modeling capabilities that allow agencies to unify disparate databases and build mission-specific applications on top of a shared data layer.

According to Wired today, DHS agencies including U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Federal Emergency Management Administration and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency will be able to access Palantir services as part of the deal.

DHS is expected to use Palantir’s platforms to support investigative case management, threat identification, logistics coordination and operational planning. The platforms apply machine learning models and rules-based analytics to information from enforcement databases, biometric systems, financial records, travel data and other sources to generate risk assessments, link analyses and operational dashboards.

The deal with Palantir isn’t the department’s first dalliance with artificial intelligence. Public AI inventory disclosures show hundreds of AI-enabled use cases across DHS, including fraud detection to anomaly identification and document processing. The Palantir agreement, though, consolidates the department’s software procurement in an environment where agencies are seeking faster integration of AI and data analytics into frontline operations.

For Palantir, the contract strengthens its position as a long-term federal technology supplier. Government contracts currently account for roughly 55% of Palantir’s revenue and the new deal will likely make that figure larger again.

The partnership also continues Palantir’s longstanding involvement in immigration and border-related data systems, an area that has attracted a lot of public and policy scrutiny.

Image: Palantir