Australia is moving ahead with a program to acquire a new air-to-surface standoff missile. The Australian defense department issued a solicitation for proposals shortly before Christmas, according to industry sources. The proposals are due April 19.
DISAPPOINTED: Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. said it was "disappointed" in the results of the VXX presidential helicopter competition, which went to a team led by Lockheed Martin. Sikorsky President Stephen N. Finger said the company wants to double its business by 2008, and anticipates "achieving this goal even absent the VXX."
Lockheed Martin Corp. scored an upset Jan. 28 as Defense Department officials awarded its team a relatively small but prestigious contract to provide the next fleet of helicopters to serve the U.S. president.
TURBOSHAFT: Military rotorcraft programs, including re-engining efforts, will drive a slight upward trend for turboshaft engines in the near future, although the civilian market for such engines will be flat, says Forecast International. Military sales will account for $7.68 billion of the market's $11.26 billion in projected value, Forecast says. From 2005 to 2014, Forecast says 21,544 aviation turboshaft engines will be produced, 11,676 of which will be military engines.
Raytheon Co.'s Complementary Low Altitude Weapon System (CLAWS) completed its development testing by scoring a direct hit on a surrogate cruise missile target, the company said Jan. 27. A series of flight-tests culminating in the direct hit were conducted at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., and demonstrated a "family of systems" weapons architecture, including the use of a Thales Raytheon Systems MPQ-64 Sentinel Radar, which provided a close air picture and tracking data, Raytheon said. CLAWS had its first flight test in September (DAILY, Sept. 2, 2004).
Zeus Holdings Limited completed its acquisition of Intelsat on Jan. 28, paying approximately $3 billion for the satellite operator and assuming $2 billion in pre-existing debt. The sale went through despite recent failures onboard two of Intelsat's spacecraft, which contractually gave Zeus the right to back out of the deal (DAILY, Jan. 24). Zeus was formed by a consortium of private equity firms Apax Partners, Apollo Management, Madison Dearborn Partners and Permira.
DAB DELAY: A Defense Acquisition Board (DAB) review of conventional munitions capability has been moved from Jan. 27 to May 2, says the Defense Department. "The purpose of the Land Attack Weapons Capability Area Review is to provide DOD decision makers with a summary of the department's 'state of health' regarding its ability to engage enemy targets with conventional munitions," a DOD spokeswoman tells The DAILY.
INTEL EQUIPMENT: DRS Technologies Inc. of Parsippany, N.J., has received $44 million in orders to provide advanced intelligence equipment used to collect communications intelligence and signal intelligence signals, the company said Jan. 28. Various intelligence agencies, U.S. government organizations, and domestic and international defense contractors awarded the contracts. DRS will provide high-performance tuners, receivers, demodulators and direction-finding equipment. The company's DRS Signal Solutions unit in Gaithersburg, Md., will do the work.
R&D SPENDING: South Korea plans to more than double its defense spending on research and development by 2015 to introduce high-tech weapons into its armed forces, the Korean Information Service says. The ministry of national defense says it will hike annual R&D funding from the current 4.5% of total defense spending to 5.3% in 2006, 7.8% in 2010, and 10% by 2015. The 4.5% of R&D defense spending represents 929 billion won ($904 million) out of a total annual defense budget of 20.8 trillion won ($20 billion).
PAPER DAB: A planned Defense Acquisition Board (DAB) meeting to review the LHA Replacement ship, or LHA(R), has been replaced by a virtual equivalent, a defense official tells The DAILY. The Feb. 1 meeting on the USS Tarawa-class amphibious ship replacement now is a "paper DAB," the official says. Meeting members will receive paperwork for their review, but no acquisition decision memorandum is necessarily produced afterward, and there is no time line for a reaction by participants.
RNEP REVIVAL? U.S. Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, says he will push to revive the Energy Department's Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP) program in the coming year. He says new efforts to educate lawmakers about the need for the bunker-buster, as well as a recent increase in the number of Senate Republicans, should help improve the program's prospects.
RAPTOR CUT? The U.S. Air Force could make do with as few as 150 F/A-22 Raptors, less than half the 381 jets the service says it needs, according to Brookings Institution analyst Michael O'Hanlon. While the Lockheed Martin-built aircraft might be needed to ensure U.S. air superiority in a war with China and possibly Iran, the F-15, which the Raptor is designed to replace, would be adequate to dominate North Korea or Syria in the air, O'Hanlon says.
SUCCESS STORIES: The Office of Naval Research released its publication of Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR), which highlights 36 companies that have "successfully" demonstrated the ability to transition research and development into products, tools, or services that help Navy acquisition. Each of the companies has transitioned its technology to a Phase III development or production effort.
The Stafford-Covey Return to Flight Task Group is engaged in "considerable debate" about what standard to hold NASA to as the agency attempts to develop a means of inspecting and repairing the shuttle's thermal protection system in orbit, according to Task Group co-chair Richard Covey.
BRACING FOR BRAC: On top of planned cutbacks to major current and future weapon systems and programs, U.S. lawmakers this year also will confront another round of decisions on the defense base realignment and closure (BRAC) process. But don't look for savings from BRAC to buttress targeted weapon systems, a Senate Armed Services Committee staff member says. BRAC savings come years later, because there are upfront costs to restructure forces and clean up military sites.
SPACE RADAR: The U.S. Air Force has formed a new Space Radar Program Office "to increase collaboration with stakeholders from both the Department of Defense and intelligence communities on a future Space Radar program," the service says. Brig. Gen. John "Tom" Sheridan will lead the office. "The new program structure will improve stakeholder interaction, allowing us to better meet the needs of both the warfighter and intelligence communities," says Peter Teets, acting secretary of the Air Force and director of the National Reconnaissance Office.
The Defense Department has completed an update to its National Military Strategy (NMS) document and plans to send it to Congress soon, according to a defense official. Navy Capt. Jeff Hesterman, chief of the strategy division in the Joint Staff's Strategic Plans and Policy Directorate, said that Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently signed off on the updated NMS.
NASA plans to launch a satellite in 2008 that will make the first map of the boundary between the solar system and interstellar space, the agency announced Jan. 27. The $134 million Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission was competitively chosen for launch under NASA's Small Explorer program. It will carry two neutral atom imagers designed to detect particles from the solar system boundary, known as the "termination shock." The Voyager 1 probe is thought to be near this area, approximately 100 astronomical units (9.3 billion miles) from the sun.
STILL THE SAME: All House Armed Services Committee subcommittee chairmen and ranking minority positions should remain the same. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), HASC chairman, on Jan. 27 formally announced that all six sitting GOP subcommittee chairmen retained their posts. Democrats will complete their ranking positions next week, but no changes are expected, according to a spokeswoman. The HASC has changed the name of its Total Force subcommittee to Military Personnel, which "clarifies its focus," the committee said. Democrats welcomed Reps.
Smiths Aerospace recently delivered mission display system hardware and software to the Boeing Co. for the U.S. Air Force's C-130 Avionics Modernization Program (AMP), the company said Jan. 26. The equipment - collectively known as the mission display processor - is the main computing environment for the AMP, Smiths said. The processor will host software, from Boeing, Smiths and others, for flight management, radio control applications and other functions.
NASA and contractor Alliant Techsystems (ATK) have completed stacking the twin solid rocket boosters (SRBs) for the space shuttle's first post-Columbia launch, scheduled for May at Kennedy Space Center, Fla. Shuttle Discovery will fly the mission, STS-114, which is to visit the International Space Station and test new safety procedures and equipment developed by NASA in response to Columbia's loss.
