Welcome to today's Defense Business Briefing, your weekly roundup of the latest defense industry news.

Oracle alleges DOD officials involved in $10B cloud project had 'significant' conflicts tied to Amazon

Oracle America is alleging two Defense Department officials helped craft a single-award strategy for the Pentagon's $10 billion cloud program while having "significant" conflicts of interest tied to their work with Amazon Web Services.

Amazon intervenes as defendant in Oracle's JEDI cloud lawsuit, calls allegations 'meritless'

Amazon Web Services has been allowed to intervene as a defendant in Oracle America's lawsuit against the federal government challenging a massive Pentagon cloud contract, as AWS argues Oracle's conflict-of-interest allegations are "meritless."

Inhofe dumps defense stocks after controversial Raytheon purchase

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-OK) has instructed his financial adviser to no longer purchase any defense stocks after news broke that he bought shares in Raytheon following a meeting with President Trump that led to a newly proposed boost in defense spending.

Pentagon to host January meetings on contract financing and performance incentives

The Defense Department said it will host three public meetings early next year "to obtain views of experts and interested parties in Government and the private sector regarding revising policies and procedures for contract financing, performance incentives, and associated regulations for DOD contracts."

Lockheed picks Colonna to lead LMIMCo

Lockheed Martin said it has named Paul Colonna president and chief investment officer of Lockheed Martin Investment Management Co., effective Jan. 7.

Maxar announces Hascall's retirement

Maxar Technologies said its chief operations officer will retire at the end of the year.

SAIC taps Morea to chair board

Science Applications International Corp. said it has named Donna Morea chair of its board of directors, effective following the closing of SAIC's planned acquisition of Engility next month.

The week ahead

Few defense events are scheduled for the week ahead, as Congress remains locked in a spending debate that could trigger a partial government shutdown.

Lord again talks performance incentives with industry amid major acquisition policy rewrite

Pentagon acquisition chief Ellen Lord, after a controversial failure earlier this year, is again approaching defense contractors to get a range of perspectives on the potential for performance incentives, while simultaneously launching a massive "clean sheet" rewrite of government procurement policy.

Pentagon plans to scale up continuous evaluation program as it takes over background investigations

Defense Department officials say their "continuous evaluation" program has already helped pare down the security clearance investigations backlog, and they plan to scale its use across all cleared personnel as the Defense Security Service takes over the federal government's background investigations mission.

Defense Business Briefing wishes our readers a safe and happy holiday season and a prosperous New Year.

The next DBB will be published Jan. 8, 2019.