CMC ELECTRONICS, Montreal and Ottawa, Canada Jean-Pierre Mortreaux has been appointed president and CEO. DIGITALGLOBE, Longmont, Colo. Yancey Spruill has been named chief financial officer. KOLLSMAN, Merrimack, N.H. Michael A. Williams has been appointed vice president of engineering. THE LUNDQUIST GROUP, Washington Timothy J. Kurth has been hired as a vice president. MANTECH INTERNATIONAL, Fairfax, Va.
The U.S. Air Force's top two officials plan to fly aboard the V-22 Osprey for the first time to assess the performance of the Bell-Boeing tiltrotor aircraft, officials said Sept. 15. Air Force Secretary James Roche and Chief of Staff John Jumper intend to take their first voyage aboard separate Ospreys later this year. Details of their trip are still being finalized, but Jumper, a pilot, told reporters at the Air Force Association's Air & Space Conference that he plans to steer one of the V-22s himself.
Aerojet has successfully hot-fire tested a solid propellant Throttling Divert and Attitude Control System (TDACS) for the U.S. Navy's Standard Missile-3 (SM-3), the company said Sept. 15. The July 28 test demonstrated the increased performance, operating flexibility and durability of the TDACS in a simulated mission scenario, the company said.
Telephonics Corp. will deliver an AN/SPN-41A all-weather instrument approach landing system for Italy's newest aircraft carrier, the Cavour, the company said Sept. 13. The Telephonics AN/SPN-41A is an all-weather, ship-based, radio frequency landing guidance system that provides azimuth and elevation data to aircraft as they approach for a landing.
HONORED: NASA honored three companies at its 13th annual Minority Business and Advocates Awards ceremony in Washington, the aerospace agency said Sept. 14. Science Systems and Applications Inc. of Lanham, Md., was named minority contractor of the year, Crewstone Technologies of Hampton, Va., was named minority subcontractor of the year and Cimarron Inc. of Houston was named women-owned business of the year.
The U.S. Air Force has implemented changes aimed at making private industry and warfighters more realistic about the weapon system acquisition process, a service official said Sept. 15.
Recent Joint Forces Command exercises that showed how multiple, dissimilar unmanned aerial vehicles can share imagery and command and control functions used a video system from Sarnoff Corp., the company said Sept. 14. The Forward Look exercises (DAILY, July 2) used the Princeton, N.J.-based Sarnoff Corp.'s VICE video exploitation system, the company said.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is slated to brief industry Sept. 16 on CrossHairs, a program to quickly detect and locate the point of origin of such threats as sniper bullets, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), mortars, shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles and anti-tank missiles (DAILY, Aug. 19).
The Lockheed Martin-led US101 team has picked General Electric Co. to provide the engines for its entry in the Air Force's Personnel Recovery Vehicle (PRV) competition, the companies announced Sept. 15. Based on AgustaWestland's EH101 helicopter, the triple-engined US101 will be assembled in the United States by Lockheed Martin and Bell Helicopter. In the PRV competition, the US101 will be up against Sikorsky's H-92, European Aeronautic Defence and Space (EADS) Company's NH-90 and Bell-Boeing's V-22 tiltrotor (DAILY, Sept. 15).
Boeing's upcoming X-45C unmanned aircraft may perform an aerial refueling demonstration as early as 2007 in conjunction with the Air Force Research Laboratory's (AFRL) Autonomous Aerial Refueling (AAR) effort, according to Darryl Davis, Boeing's Joint Unmanned Combat Air System (J-UCAS) program manager. AFRL partnered with Boeing and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in 2002 on the AAR effort, with the refueling of unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs) such as the X-45C in mind (DAILY, Aug. 21, 2003).
The U.S. Air Force is attempting to pull together a set of joint requirements from across the services to build a stronger case for the beleaguered Space Based Radar (SBR) program, according to Peter Teets, undersecretary of the Air Force for space.
With $2 billion of extra funding a year from supplementals and reprogramming, the U.S. Army is providing soldiers with better body armor, helmets, boots and other pieces of clothing, said Lt. Gen. Joseph Yakovac, military deputy to the assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology. Yakovac, along with other Army officials, spoke Sept. 13 at the Association of the U.S. Army (AUSA) Acquisition Symposium in Falls Church, Va.
The consolidation of Minneapolis-based Alliant Techsystems' (ATK) medium-caliber manufacturing operations to the Allegany Ballistics Laboratory in Rocket Center, W.Va. has been successfully completed, the company said Sept. 15. Four months after stopping production in Minnesota, the company is producing medium-caliber components in West Virginia.
PREPARING FOR IVAN: NASA is securing Stennis Space Center in Mississippi and the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans in anticipation of the arrival of Hurricane Ivan. Most workers at both facilities were sent home Sept. 14, according to NASA, except for a skeleton crew that will remain on site through the storm. At Stennis, two flight-qualified space shuttle main engines (SSMEs) have been secured. At Michoud, where Lockheed Martin manufactures the shuttle's external tanks, equipment has been moved indoors and buildings sandbagged.
NOMINATED: President Bush intends to nominate Duratek Inc. Vice Chairman Francis J. Harvey to be secretary of the Army and Arden Bement Jr. to be director of the National Science Foundation. Bement currently is the NSF's acting director.
The Netherlands has requested the sale of 55 Standard Missile-2 (SM-2) Block IIIA missiles, 55 MK 14 MOD 0 canisters and related equipment, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress on Sept. 15. The deal could be worth $70 million, including spares and repair parts, training and support, DSCA said. "The Netherlands navy intends to use the SM-2 missiles on its destroyer-class surface ships for self-defense against air and cruise missile threats in the Netherlands and the NATO theater," DSCA said.
Joint Strike Fighter program officials dedicated the F-35 Robotic Component Finish Facility at Lockheed Martin in Fort Worth, Texas on Sept. 14, the company said. The 82,000-square-foot building contains support and control areas, two robotic finish rooms and five multipurpose finish rooms. A variety of coatings will be applied to large and small F-35 parts by human and robotic workers. The building connects to the factory where F-35s are being assembled.
BAE Systems Avionics Group and Kaman Aerospace Corp. are teaming to provide an intermediate maritime helicopter package based on BAE Systems' mission system and sensor suite and Kaman's SH-2G Super Seasprite, BAE Systems said Sept. 14. Initial efforts will be focused on autonomous self-protection suites, NATO interoperable communications and navigation systems, and sensor and target acquisition packages, as well as a range of anti-surface and anti-submarine weapons, the Basildon, England-based company said. Kaman Aerospace is based in Bloomfield, Conn.
The third of a class of four "air independent" non-nuclear submarines was christened Sept. 13 in Germany, according to HDW, the sub's builder. It said the submarine, designated U33, is slated to enter service in the German navy on Jan. 31, 2006. The Class 212 A subs feature HDW's air-independent propulsion system, based on the hydrogen fuel cell. The cell produces electricity from hydrogen and oxygen and enables the subs to remain submerged for weeks at a time, according to the company.
By combining the Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program contract to include both General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin, the U.S. Army will accelerate the program's development, the WIN-T project manager said Sept. 14. Combining contractors establishes a single baseline for the WIN-T program, rather than two that would be offered by competing WIN-T teams, according to Col. Angel Colon, the WIN-T project manager. Under the previous acquisition strategy, the Army would have selected one of the proposed systems in late 2005.
The RainStorm Advanced Precision Targeting System, a new software product that locates and pinpoints targets for precision-guided munitions, has been unveiled by the Northrop Grumman Corp., the company said Sept. 14.
Aculight Corp. of Bothell, Wash., will develop a compact, rugged, short-pulse fiber laser source under a $750,000 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract from the Department of Energy, the company said Sept. 14. The system could be used in active imaging and remote sensing systems, the company said, and will be based on Aculight's pulsed fiber laser technology. Aculight also will produce a compact ultraviolet laser for use in Raman spectroscopy for the National Institute of Health under a $100,000 SBIR contract.
Information technology provider Titan Corp. will open its new 280,000 square-foot office complex in Reston, Va. on Sept. 15, the company said. Titan's new, 16-story facility, located at Two Freedom Square, will serve as the company's Washington headquarters for five of its eight business sectors that provide technology and systems to the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the intelligence community and other government agencies, the company said Sept. 14.
