India’s next national communication satellite, GSAT-16, is scheduled to be launched in December to augment its communications capability and boost existing services. The 3,150-kg (3.5-ton) satellite will be dual-manifested on a European Ariane 5 rocket along with another satellite, DirecTV-14, says a senior scientist at the Indian Space Research Organization. The liftoff of GSAT-16, initially slated for next year, has been advanced by six months to meet the rapidly growing demand for GSAT services.
Engility and Tasc announced Oct. 28 that they will merge in a $1.1 billion stock-and-debt deal, creating an expanded and diversified engineering services company for U.S. government customers. After the deal closes, which is expected in January, Engility’s overall defense market concentration will fall to 48% from 64%, with 28% of total business stemming from intelligence agencies and the last 24% from the Homeland Security Department, FAA and NASA combined.
Cobham’s new 12-year, $563 million contract to provide an airborne search-and-rescue capability for Australia should add 1% to the British-based company’s top line, RBC Capital Markets analysts said Oct. 24 after the deal was unveiled.
In a recent Up Front column (Oct. 13, p. 16), Richard Aboulafia misattributed a quote to Boeing Senior Vice President Tim Keating. The comment was made by Ray Goforth, executive director of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace.
Investigation team says 2 sec. before beginning to break up in midair, the vehicle's two moveable tail booms unexpectedly began to deploy into a feathering position.
The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments paper details the roles of new and existing systems in the Third Offset strategy; a larger role for the Long-Range Strike Bomber is one of several systems listed.
Ahead of the Zhuhai air show, Aviation Week's International Defense Editor Bill Sweetman talks to Defense Managing Editor Jen DiMascio about the J-20 Chinese fighter.
The official unveiling of Pratt & Whitney Canada’s PW800 turbofan at this year’s National Business Aviation Association convention marked a sea change in the provision of engines for the world’s long-range business jets.
In contrast to Tokyo’s Narita and Haneda airports, Kansai has been able to use its greater available capacity to draw new flights from Japanese and foreign airlines. It is positioning itself well to take advantage of an increase in overseas visitor numbers. This has been particularly evident with LCCs, as Japan’s new budget airlines establish bases and grow their networks at Kansai. In addition, several foreign LCCs have launched service to Osaka, and more plan to follow.
Indian LCC IndiGo has given Airbus its largest single order to date, for 250 new A320neos. A successful IPO in a still tumultuous air transport market will be key to fund the order—and it would cement IndiGo’s position as India’s leading domestic airline.
Many of Europe’s legacy airlines, Austrian Airlines among them, are experiencing bitter disputes with employees about cost cuts. But now that Austrian seems to have found a compromise with labor, management attention is shifting to fleet renewal and a sustainable model.
Airbus is close to launching an increased maximum-takeoff and long-range version of the A321neo that it seeks to position as a Boeing 757 replacement. The manufacturer is briefing potential customers, but has not yet made a decision to proceed. An Airbus official says the new version is still in a project study.
The strong pipeline of new products, many announced but some still to come, provided a boost in Honeywell’s latest forecast for the delivery of 9,450 business jets valued at $280 billion through 2024.
A spacecraft designed to test reentry techniques for a future lunar-sample return mission lifted off from the Xichang launch facility on a Long March 3C Oct. 23 (Oct. 24 local time) on a week-long mission that will take it around the Moon. Citing a spokesman for the China National Space Administration, China Daily’s English-language edition says the testbed will return to Earth after a swing around the Moon to test a “skip” reentry technique to bleed off velocity before a parachute touchdown in the Gobi Desert.
Moody’s Investors Service believes the European transport infrastructure industry will remain stable over the next 12-18 months on growth in traffic volume. “We expect EU airport passenger levels to grow by 2-6% in 2014 and 1-4% in 2015, mainly driven by an increase in airline capacity,” says senior Moody’s analyst Joanna Fic.
The steady drop in oil prices is not yet raising concerns at Boeing or on Wall Street that airlines will alter their emerging pattern of lining up a historically high percentage of new deliveries as replacements for less efficient, older-generation aircraft. “The price of oil still could fall a long way before our planes are anything but compelling,” Boeing Chairman and CEO Jim McNerney said last week.
Mergers and acquisitions activity in the U.S. aerospace and defense industry slowed in the third quarter, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers. Total deal volume slipped to the lowest level in 11 quarters, and was the weakest since the second quarter of 2005. The trend, reported by Aviation Week last month, comes as many A&D participants had once thought this year would mark the beginning of a wave of strategic M&A in Western industry. Divestitures continue to remain favorite business-shaping tools as companies divide or slice off divisions deemed non-core, slow-growth or worse.
Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded Kremlin-controlled aircraft maker Irkut, a subsidiary of United Aircraft Corp., based on Russia’s worsening economic situation. The U.S.-based credit rating agency says it still believes Irkut and other state-backed companies will enjoy state support if they encounter “financial distress.” Not every state-backed Russian company will see ratings downgraded, albeit because they were lower already. For instance, Moody’s reaffirmed outlooks on Russian Helicopters.
