Tom Darcy has been named executive vice president for strategic projects. Mark Sopp has been appointed executive vice president and chief financial officer.
Samuel Coleman, director of supply chain management for Patriarch Partners Management Group, an investment fund, will provide supply chain support. Peter Hokanson has been named chief financial officer. Randy Kesterson, chief operating officer, has left the company. David Langenhuizen has been appointed general manager of operations. Andrew Logan has been named chief technology officer. Robert Rene, chief executive officer, has left the company.
Congress, in the fiscal 2006 defense spending act, continued its growing trend of tapping regular funds to pay for pet priorities while transferring the costs to "emergency" supplemental spending that does not have to meet budget caps, according to watchdog Winslow Wheeler of the Center for Defense Information. Wheeler counted 17 of these transfers from the peacetime procurement account to the supplemental spending account for a total of $654 million, including $11.2 million for Army aircraft survivability equipment.
Northrop Grumman said Jan. 24 that its net income grew 22 percent in the fourth quarter of 2005 and 29 percent for the full year. The company also raised its 2006 guidance for cash from operations and earnings per share. Fourth quarter '05 net income climbed to $331 million, or 92 cents per share, compared to $272 million, or 74 cents per share, for the same period the year before. For all of 2005, net income increased from $1.1 billion, or $2.97 per share, in 2004 to $1.4 billion, or $3.85 cents per share.
NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers are entering their third year of operations on the red planet and continue to perform well despite some signs of wear, according to NASA. The two rovers are on their third mission extension, which lasts through September, provided they remain usable that long. Their original three-month baseline missions ended in April 2004.
SUPPORT SERVICES: The U.S. Navy has awarded L-3 Vertex Aerospace LLC of Madison, Miss., a $27 million contract to provide support services for the E-6B fleet, the Defense Department said Jan. 24. The work will be done at Tinker Air Force Base, Okla.; Naval Air Station, Patuxent River, Md.; Travis Air Force Base, Calif.; and Offutt Air Force Base, Neb. It is expected to be finished in October 2006.
Boeing Co. said it will install a high-energy laser in a C-130H aircraft for tests next year that could lead to full-scale development of a laser gunship. Boeing's Missile Defense Systems unit took delivery of the plane on Jan. 18 in Crestview, Fla., near Eglin Air Force Base. The plane, which belongs to the U.S. Air Force's 46th Test Wing, is being modified under the Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) program to carry a high-energy chemical laser and battle management and beam control subsystems, Boeing said in a Jan. 23 announcement.
The Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank organized in part by a former President Clinton chief of staff, said the Defense Department should support or even expand seven major weapons programs such as the B-2 heavy bomber and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter while killing another eight such as the DD(X) destroyer and the C-130J transport aircraft. The center on Jan. 24 released its "progressive quadrennial defense review," in part to provide an alternative plan to the DOD's Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), which will be released next month.
Boeing is finally showing off one of its more poorly kept secrets. Its planners are polishing the design for an EP-3E-replacement signals intelligence aircraft for the U.S. Navy and a likely future offering for the international market. The new design, revealed Jan. 24, comes in response to the death of the Army/Navy Aerial Common Sensor contract offered by Lockheed Martin.
The National Defense Industrial Association is calling for increased funding for combat aircraft survivability technologies, analysis methodologies and test facilities. The Washington-based trade association for the defense industry has identified the issue as part of its 2006 legislative agenda for Capitol Hill.
Israel will upgrade its U.S.-built F-15 and F-16 fighters to allow them to remain in service until at least 2020, the Israel Defense Forces said Jan. 22. It estimated the cost to be in the "tens of millions of dollars." F-15 upgrades include replacement of electronic warfare systems and an improvement in the ability to carry advanced bombs, the IDF said. F-16s will get new control and inspection systems to match those of newer F-16-I models, deliveries of which began last year, as well as more advanced cockpit screens.
REBUILD CONTRACT: Oshkosh Truck Corp. of Oshkosh, Wis., has been awarded a $44.2 million contract to rebuild M1070 heavy equipment transporter trucks, M1074 and M1075 palletized loading system trucks, fuel tank assemblies and M1076 palletized loading system trailers, the Defense Department said Jan. 24. The work will be done in Oshkosh, Wis., and is expected to be finished by Nov. 30, 2006.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is recommending that NASA adopt a standardized "knowledge-based" acquisition approach at all of its centers as it tackles the challenges of returning astronauts to the moon and beyond.
U.S. efforts to develop, test and deploy effective ballistic missile defense (BMD) systems based on kinetic energy hit-to-kill technology have had "mixed and ambiguous results," and the actual wartime performance of one system already deployed, the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missile, is "similarly ambiguous," the Congressional Research Service has concluded.
LITTORAL TECH: The U.S. Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Systems has chosen Science Applications International Corp. for a $33 million contract regarding maritime and littoral surveillance technologies. SAIC will provide program configuration management, technical services, systems engineering, algorithm development, hardware and software development, material analysis, data processing, testing, repair, installation, deployment, recovery and analysis. The work will be performed in San Diego, where the first Littoral Combat Ships will be based.
The U.S. Navy will propose a 14-ship Maritime Prepositioning Force (Future), or MPF(F), as part of its long-term shipbuilding plans. The proposal includes a new class of 28,423-ton Mobile Landing Platform (MLP) ships that carry 1,300 personnel and sail at up to 20 knots. Navy Rear Adm. Charles Hamilton III, program executive officer for ships, outlined the reworked MPF(F) to the Surface Navy Association's national symposium and said each squad would include three of the new MLPs.
ARMY Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., Stratford, Conn., was awarded on Jan. 13, 2006, a $341,302,911 modification to a firm-fixed-price contract for UH-60L and UH-60M Blackhawk helicopters. The work will be performed in Stratford, Conn., and is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2007. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This was a sole source contract initiated on Oct. 4, 2000. The U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (DAAH23-02-C-0006).
The Homeland Security Department has officially combined all Customs and Border Protection (CBP) marine vessels, programs and personnel under the newly retitled Office of CBP Air and Marine. The move, announced Jan. 17, merges all the marine assets to mirror consolidation benefits expected by the previous combination of aviation assets from the CBP and the Border Patrol under CBP Air (DAILY, Nov. 30, 2005).
UNMANNED TRUCK: Oshkosh Truck Corp. unveiled an unmanned version of its Palletized Load System (PLS) vehicle Jan. 23 at the U.S. Army Tactical Wheeled Vehicle Component Technology Demonstrations in Yuma, Ariz. The driverless truck transported cargo between destinations seven miles apart in the Arizona desert. The unmanned navigational kit being applied to the PLS was tested at the 2004 and 2005 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Grand Challenge races. Oshkosh is partnered with Rockwell Collins and the University of Parma, Italy, on the kit's development.
