6 Correspondence 8 Who's Where 10 Market Focus 12 Industry Outlook 13 Airline Outlook 15 In Orbit 16-18 World News Roundup 21 Washington Outlook 45 Inside Avionics 54-55 Classified 56 Contact Us 57 Aerospace Calendar
World News Roundup 16 European Defense Agency eyes tech- nologies for long-endurance UAVs 17 Germany probes air proximity inci- dent over North Atlantic 17 France and neighbors dismantling national airspace restrictions 18 Break-up of Italy's Vitrociset group entering its final phase World News & Analysis 22 Ex-Missile agency chief seeks way to fix Pentagon procurement 24 U.K. industry, government tackle policy, acquisition concerns
Formal World Trade Organization proceedings are set to commence this week to start adjudicating the U.S.-European battle over aircraft subsidies. However, European government officials may make a last-minute offer to settle the Boeing-Airbus matter outside the WTO.
Bruce Hoffman has been appointed to the Rand corporate chair in counterterrorism and counterinsurgency. He will continue as director of Rand's Washington office. Hoffman also has been a senior adviser on counterterrorism to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq.
The European Commission has issued a final warning to the Cypriot government to come into compliance with community rules on civil air traffic investigations or face litigation. The commission issued a "reasoned opinion" that the country needs to demonstrate it is complying with a rule that every accident or serious incident be reviewed by an independent civil aviation entity. Cyprus has two months to show it is in compliance with European Union rules. Otherwise, the European Commission may bring a case against the country before the European Court of Justice.
The article on Airbus' selection of a U.S. assembly site should have been entitled "Alabama Wins, U.S. Aerospace Workers and Nation Lose" (AW&ST June 27, p. 34).
Two air show-related crashes in North America resulted in fatalities last week. Veteran air show performers and long-time members of the International Council of Air Shows, Jim Franklin and Bobby Younkin, were killed on July 10 in a midair collision while performing at the Saskatchewan Air Show in Moose Jaw. They were flying in small biplanes, simulating a World War I-era dogfight.
China's new Shijian 7 scientific spacecraft is completing checkout in orbit following its July 6 launch on board a Long March 2D from the Jiuquan space center in the Gobi Desert (photo). The Jiuquan pad used for the flight is part of a new twin-pad complex built there over the past several years for both Shenzhou manned flights and for unmanned missions. The Shenzhou Long March 2F pad is located only a few thousand feet from where the 2D lofted the science mission. The Shijian 7 flight is part of a long series of Shijian multi-disciplinary science endeavors.
Uncertainty is a way of life when it comes to managing air traffic, but new probability analysis is aimed at taming this beast. For traffic flow managers, uncertainty about what might happen on any day in a given block of airspace is exacerbated by canceled or added flights, variable traffic flow and disruptive weather.
An incident involving a Vietnam Airlines flight to Moscow last week highlights ongoing coordination problems between Russian civil and military air traffic control systems. The weekly Hanoi-Moscow flight was almost directed to leave Russian airspace after miscommunication between Russian civilian and air force controllers. The air force had not received formal notification from ATC on the flight and ordered controllers to divert the Boeing 777.
BAE Systems may take a while to digest its $4.2-billion acquisition last month of United Defense Industries (UDI), but the U.K.-based company isn't finished shopping in the U.S. market. "The strategy remains the same," BAE Chairman Dick Olver said on a visit to Washington last week. BAE's North American subsidiary has made six acquisitions in the past 14 months and now accounts for about one-third of the company's total revenues (AW&ST Feb. 7, p. 49). But Olver says there's still room to grow, noting that the U.S. makes up nearly half of the global defense market.
GENERAL DYNAMICS CANADA HAS CHOSEN Telephonics Corp. of Farmingdale, N.Y., to supply 31 shipsets of integrated maritime surveillance radar and Mk. XIIA identification-friend-or-foe hardware and optional spares. The contract, valued at more than $50 million, also includes 20 years of service and support. First deliveries are set for July 2007.
The agenda for the latest meeting of Britain's National Defense Industry Council is suitably terse, covering just two items--acquisition and defense industrial strategy. Both are deemed critical. Senior industry executives and government officials met under the banner of the National Defense Industry Council (NDIC) July 5 to begin to thrash out acquisition and industrial policy issues.
THE FAA MADE ONE SMALL STEP toward a satellite-based navigation system on July 7 when it decommissioned 216 NDB approach procedures. But FAA spokesman Paul Takemoto notes that the actual decommissioning of NDB ground-based navaids is farther down the road. Currently, he says, 80% of NDB services are provided by nongovernment entities such as airports, municipalities and state governments.
European Union and Chinese civil aviation representatives plan to meet in September to clear the way for both sides to formally negotiate an agreement that would supplant bilateral civil aviation accords EU members have struck with Beijing. The formal talks should commence late this year, EU and Chinese aviation authorities said during a summit concluded early this month. Also on their agenda is opening technical cooperation to China on matters of aviation safety and air traffic management, including the Sesame program.
When the logo of Kingfisher beer appeared on the Benetton-sponsored Formula One race car more than a decade ago, few fathomed that the high-profile brew was an Indian company. But at this year's Paris air show, when parliamentarian and liquor baron Vijay Mallya, chairman of Kingfisher's parent company, the UB Group, placed a firm order for five Airbus A380s, five A330s and five A350s on behalf of his new Kingfisher Airlines, the branding had become universally recognizable.
CMC ELECTRONICS AIMS TO MORE THAN DOUBLE its sales in five years, to more than $400 million, according to Jean-Pierre Mortreux, the president of the Canadian company. In the past four years, CMC's revenues have grown 60% and should hit $160 million this year. Meanwhile, staffing has increased 20%, to 1,000 employees. The growth comes at a time when CMC has won business as a systems integrator, complementing its traditional role as an avionics component and subsystem supplier.
Faced with spending hundreds of millions of dollars to complete a space station its astronauts would visit for at most a couple of dozen two-week stays by the soon-to-be-retired space shuttle, NASA is pushing hard on a "balanced approach" to amending the Iran Non-proliferation Act (INA) of 2000. So far, it has gotten exactly nowhere. The law prohibits U.S. payments to Russia for International Space Station goods and services, and after existing agreements expire next April that will include seats on the Soyuz lifeboats docked at the ISS.
The British Defense Ministry has selected BAE Systems for the next phase of its Falcon tactical secure communications setup. Falcon will operate with the Bowman network, Skynet V satcoms and other similar systems. Falcon is one of several at the procurement stage that will provide the infrastructure for the U.K.'s network-enabled capability.
USAF Lt. Gen. Duncan McNabb, Joint Staff logistics director, has been selected for a fourth star. If approved by the Senate, he will take the top post at Air Mobility Command.
Walter Havenstein (see photos) has become president of the BAE Systems Electronics and Integrated Solutions Group, Nashua, N.H.; Marshall Banker, president of the Customer Solutions Operating Group, Arlington, Va.; and Thomas Rabaut, president of the Land and Armaments Group, also in Arlington. Havenstein was executive vice president, while Banker was president of BAE's Information Systems Sector. Rabaut was president/CEO of United Defense.
Richard L. Armitage has been named to the board of directors of the ManTech International Corp., Fairfax, Va. He is a former U.S. deputy secretary of State, ambassador and assistant Defense secretary.
To submit Aerospace Calendar Listings, Call +1 (212) 904-2421 Fax +1 (212) 904-6068 e-mail: [email protected] July 25-27--Institute for Defense and Government Advancement's "Nanotechnology for Defense." Georgetown Conference Center, Washington. Call +1 (800) 882-8684, fax +1 (973) 256-0205 or see www.idga.org
You can now register ONLINE for Aviation Week Events. Go to www.AviationNow.com/conferences or call Lydia Janow at +1 (212) 904-3225/+1 (800) 240-7645 ext. 5 (U.S. and Canada Only) Oct. 18-20--MRO Europe. Estrel Hotel & Convention Center, Berlin. Nov. 8-10--MRO Asia, Suntec City, Singapore. Nov. 14-16--A&D Programs & Productivity Conference, Phoenix. PARTNERSHIPS Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Seminars:
