The short answer
Constellis and Calvis almost never compete for the same buyer, and any comparison that pretends otherwise is wasting your time.
Constellis is a risk-management and protective-services company headquartered in Herndon, Virginia. Its own materials describe a workforce of more than 10,900 people, operations in 25 or more countries, roughly $0.8 billion in 2025 revenue, and over 50 years of combined experience across the brands it consolidated. Its work is concentrated in federal contracting and high-consequence environments: armed protective services for the State Department overseas, protective force at Department of Energy nuclear sites, base operations support for the Navy, K-9 detection, contingency operations, and training.
Calvis is a marketplace that connects buyers with independently licensed local security agencies for ordinary U.S. commercial guarding. It does not employ officers and is not the security provider. It vets agencies, publishes each one's flat hourly rate up front, and lets you compare qualified local options without an annual contract.
The honest version: if your requirement involves a federal contract vehicle, a cleared workforce, a diplomatic post in a high-threat country, a nuclear facility, or a deployed expeditionary environment, Constellis is the right kind of vendor and a marketplace is categorically not. If you need guards at a warehouse, an office park, a dispensary, a construction site, an apartment community, or a one-weekend event in a U.S. metro, you are not a Constellis buyer, and the procurement machinery that makes Constellis good at its job is pure overhead for yours.
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What Constellis actually is
The name covers a group of businesses rather than a single guarding operation. Constellis states that it was formed in 2010 to combine companies in the complex risk management industry, and its published history lists legacy brands including Triple Canopy, Centerra, Olive Group, OMNIPLEX, AMK9, Gregg Protection Services, Edinburgh International, Strategic Social, and Constellis Advisors and Training. Those names still appear as the contracting entities on federal awards, which is why you may encounter Constellis under a subsidiary's name rather than the parent's.
The public record on what it sells is unusually clear, because federal contract awards are announced.
High-threat protective services for the State Department. Triple Canopy holds a position on the Worldwide Protective Services III multiple-award IDIQ, a vehicle with a $15 billion ordering ceiling covering armed personal protective details, static guard, and team-based emergency response for U.S. diplomatic requirements overseas. In 2022 it was awarded a task order valued at approximately $1.3 billion for protective services in Baghdad.
Army global protective services. On June 13, 2025, Triple Canopy was awarded a spot on the Global Protective Services MATOC from U.S. Army Contracting Command in Rock Island, a vehicle with a $10.3 billion ceiling and a ten-year ordering period, which phases out the predecessor Security Support Services Global contract.
Protective force at DOE nuclear sites. Centerra won a Department of Energy contract valued at approximately $1 billion, structured as a five-year base with two option periods, to run safeguards and security at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The scope includes protective force, physical protection, personnel and information security, law enforcement, aviation operations, and material transportation security.
Federal facility protection. Triple Canopy was awarded a task order valued at approximately $95 million for protective security officers and supervision at U.S. Food and Drug Administration headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Federal contract vehicles. Constellis entities hold GSA OASIS+ Unrestricted, WEXMAC 2.0, and multiple GSA Multiple Award Schedule contracts across Centerra, OMNIPLEX, Triple Canopy, AMK9, Gregg Protection Services, and ACADEMI Training Center.
Its own services page lists armed and unarmed officers, K-9 explosive and narcotic detection, access control, mobile patrol, command center operations, and executive protection, with named focus areas that include DOE, NRC, and NASA facilities, energy assets and utilities, data centers, and large special events.
That last group is the only place the two models brush against each other, and even there the fit is narrow. Read the contract list again and the pattern is obvious: this is a company organized around federal acquisition, cleared personnel, and missions where the consequence of failure is national rather than commercial.
Where Constellis is clearly the right answer
A comparison that never concedes anything is marketing, not analysis. Here is where a marketplace is the wrong tool and you should be talking to Constellis or a peer.
Overseas high-threat protection. Diplomatic security in a conflict or post-conflict environment requires a workforce, a clearance posture, a medical and logistics tail, and a contract vehicle that no U.S. local guarding agency possesses. This is the core of what Constellis does.
Federal contracts and set-aside procurement. If your requirement will be competed through GSA, an IDIQ, a MATOC, or a task order against an existing vehicle, you need a vendor already on the vehicle with the compliance apparatus to bid it. Our guide to federal government contract security guard services walks through how that procurement path differs from commercial buying.
Nuclear, DOE, and other cleared sites. Protective force work at a Category I nuclear facility is a licensed, federally regulated discipline with its own qualification standards. It is not a staffing problem you solve by comparing hourly rates.
Expeditionary and contingency operations. Base life support, deployed logistics, and standing up security in an austere environment are program-management problems as much as security problems.
Counter-UAV, K-9 detection, and specialized training programs. These are capital-intensive capabilities with certification requirements that local commercial agencies generally do not carry.
Multinational corporate risk programs. If you are protecting extractive operations, an embassy-adjacent compound, or executives traveling in genuinely hostile regions, you want a firm with in-country infrastructure and intelligence support.
If your need is on that list, stop comparing and go get a Constellis quote. Nothing below applies to you.
What Constellis is not built for
The mirror image is equally true. The characteristics that make a federal protective-services contractor credible are the same characteristics that make it a poor match for routine commercial guarding.
Pricing is bid, not published. Federal work is priced through proposals against solicitations, with wage determinations, cleared-labor premiums, and program overhead baked in. There is no rate card, and we will not invent one. If you want to know what an unarmed officer costs at your building next Tuesday, that model cannot tell you quickly.
Procurement cycles are long. A task order competed against an IDIQ is measured in months. Commercial guarding needs are frequently measured in days.
Minimum viable engagements are large. The contracts above are valued in the hundreds of millions to billions. A single overnight post at a self-storage facility is not a business a firm with that cost structure is organized to serve, and it would be strange to expect otherwise.
The capability is deeper than most buyers need. Cleared personnel, counter-UAV, and contingency logistics are expensive to maintain. If your actual requirement is a visible deterrent at a loading dock, you are being quoted against infrastructure you will never touch.
None of this is a criticism. It is the ordinary consequence of specialization. A firm optimized for a diplomatic compound in a high-threat country is not going to be the low-friction option for a retail center in Phoenix, and a marketplace built for the retail center has no business bidding a diplomatic compound.
How the Calvis marketplace works differently
Calvis is a marketplace, not a security agency. You describe the coverage you need and Calvis matches you with independently licensed local agencies that have already been vetted. The officers are employed and licensed by those agencies, and each agency's license is attributed to it through its state regulator.
You compare several agencies rather than negotiate with one. Instead of running a separate sales process per vendor, you see multiple vetted local options for the same post and choose on rate, credentials, and availability.
Rates are visible before you book. Each agency's flat hourly rate is shown up front, with unarmed, armed, mobile patrol, and specialized posts priced accordingly.
No annual contract is required to start. A single shift, a weekend, an event, or ongoing recurring coverage are all bookable without a term commitment.
Verification happens before the officer arrives. Agency licenses and individual guard registrations are verified against state databases as a condition of appearing on the marketplace, and guard credentials and GPS-verified patrol records are visible in your dashboard.
The limits are just as clear. Calvis covers U.S. metros. It places licensed commercial officers through local agencies. It does not hold federal contract vehicles, does not field cleared personnel, does not operate overseas, and does not run protective force at nuclear facilities. Where those are the requirement, this is the wrong tool and we will say so plainly.
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Head-to-head comparison
| Factor | Constellis | Calvis marketplace |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Risk-management and protective-services contractor | Marketplace connecting buyers with licensed local agencies |
| Primary buyer | Federal agencies, defense, critical infrastructure, multinational risk programs | U.S. commercial and residential property, events, projects |
| Geographic focus | 25+ countries, including high-threat environments | U.S. metros |
| How you buy | Solicitation, proposal, task order against a contract vehicle | Compare agencies online and book |
| Pricing visibility | Bid per solicitation; not published | Flat hourly rates shown before booking |
| Typical engagement size | Multi-year programs valued in the millions to billions | A single shift up to ongoing recurring coverage |
| Time to coverage | Procurement cycle measured in months | Days, often faster for standard posts |
| Cleared and high-threat personnel | Core capability | Not offered |
| Federal contract vehicles | GSA OASIS+, WEXMAC 2.0, GSA MAS, WPS III, GPS MATOC | None |
| Specialized capabilities | K-9 detection, counter-UAV, contingency ops, training | Guarding services offered by network agencies |
| Credential visibility | Program documentation and clearance records | Guard credentials and GPS patrol record in dashboard |
| Best fit | Government, defense, nuclear, overseas high-threat | Offices, warehouses, retail, construction, events, patrol |
The way to read that table is not as a scoreboard. It is two vendors solving different problems with the structures those problems demand.
Choosing the right one for your job
If you are responding to a federal solicitation. Your shortlist should be firms already on the relevant vehicle. Compare Constellis against other WPS III and OASIS+ holders on past performance at comparable sites, not on hourly rate. Read how a security RFP differs from instant booking if you are unsure which procurement path your requirement actually falls under.
If you protect critical infrastructure with a federal nexus. Utilities, nuclear, and certain data center environments sit in a middle band. Ask directly whether your site's requirements are regulated or merely sensitive. Regulated pushes you toward a federal contractor. Sensitive but commercial usually does not.
If you need executive or close protection. This one genuinely splits. Travel into high-risk regions with intelligence support and in-country infrastructure is a Constellis-class problem. Domestic details, residential coverage, and event protection for a principal in a U.S. metro are well served by vetted local specialists. See executive protection for how that domestic version is structured.
If you need standard commercial guarding. Offices, warehouses, retail, construction sites, apartment communities, and events are ordinary U.S. guarding, and paying federal-contractor overhead for them makes no sense. Compare vetted local agencies on rate and responsiveness instead. Commercial security covers the common post types.
If your need is urgent or short-term. Procurement cycles and long agreements are the wrong instruments for a ninety-day project or a next-week vacancy. Emergency and short-notice security covers fast-turnaround coverage.
If you are still deciding between a national brand and a local agency. That is the more common real decision for commercial buyers. National versus local security guard companies works through the tradeoffs, and Calvis vs Prosegur covers the closest enterprise-multinational comparison.
Whichever direction you go, the same three habits protect you. Get the bill rate in writing before the process advances. Confirm any agency's license directly with the state regulator rather than accepting a certificate at face value. And match the contract term to the actual job rather than to the vendor's default. Our guide on how to vet a security guard company covers the checks that matter most.
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