• JTG Inc. won a $575,046 contract from the Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications (CSCC) to “counter violent extremist messages in English.” The State Department group, created in 2011 by President Obama and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, aims to directly confront extremist messages released by terrorist groups. The State Department says it expects to produce “a high volume of rapidly‐produced banners and short videos that respond to current events,” according to documents. The media will be attributed to the U.S. State Department and will focus on “the radicalization and recruitment efforts of al-Qa’ida and related groups such as al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula, al-Shabaab, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria,” among others.

{mosads}• The National Institutes of Health awarded a contract worth a maximum of $48.8 million to help it develop therapies for treating and preventing HIV. Nonprofit research organization SRI International will “provide services that will support the development of therapies for HIV infection and its complications and co-infections, and microbicides for preventing the sexual transmission of HIV. The services provided under this contract will assist investigators in academic settings and pharmaceutical firms in filling specific gaps in their drug development plans as they advance their product(s) towards clinical investigation.”

• The Small Business Administration is commissioning a study on small businesses in the United States, and how particular parts of patent reform passed in 2011’s Leahy-Smith America Invents Act affect them and their ability to obtain patents. Bella Research Group, located near Boston, won the 12-month contract worth about $150,000. The law requires the Office of Advocacy of the Small Business Administration to conduct the study, which will examine “issues related to small business and innovation, job growth, and green entrepreneurship.”

• The Department of Homeland Security awarded a $23 million contract to security company Quality Investigation Inc. to provide “protective security officer services throughout the State of Arkansas.” The guards will “protect federal personnel and property at federally owned and leased buildings.”

• Cellphones for the U.S. Embassy in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic, is costing the State Department more than $247,000. The service will be provided by Vodafone Czech Republic. The contract is for one year, with three options to extend it another 12 months.

 Contract information is compiled from General Services Administration data and government press releases. Send announcements about government contracts to mwilson@thehill.com.