After a one-year delay, the U.S. Navy begins its modernization push with a request for $7.5 billion for aircraft procurement in fiscal 1999, a 16% increase over the $6.3 billion appropriated for FY '98. A senior defense official said two of the most important programs in the 1999 budget are the ramp-ups of the F/A-18E/F and the V-22. Almost every other aircraft procurement program remains at nearly the same level.
Sundstrand Corp. earned $183 million on sales of $1.8 billion in 1997, up from earnings of $114 million on sales of $1.5 billion in 1996. The Rockford, Ill., company said that in the Aerospace segment, sales grew 28% to $1 billion during 1997, due to a 44% increase in commercial OEM sales to $328 million, 27% growth of commercial aftermarket sales to $409 million and a 12% increase in military sales to $264 million. Operating profit jumped 40% to $200 million. Full year orders grew 54%, led by a 140% jump in commercial OEM orders.
The Pentagon has requested a total of $4 billion in fiscal year 1999 for ballistic missile defense programs, which includes a slight increase to the National Missile Defense (NMD) program and keeps the troubled Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) program on track.
CUBIC COMMUNICATIONS INC. (CCI), San Diego, reached an agreement with Rohde&Schwartz, Munich, to cooperatively develop, make and market an advanced digital VHF Data Link Radio for the air traffic control market. Development and production will be concentrated at CCI's San Diego facility.
BOMBARDIER AEROSPACE broke ground for a 123,000-square-foot expansion to its existing Aviation Services facility in Tucson, Ariz. The expansion will provide support maintenance activities for the Global Express business jet and provide space for additional completions of the widebody Challenger 604. Operations in the expansion should begin this summer.
The U.S. Dept. of Defense today will request a fiscal year 1999 budget of $257.3 billion, while the overall national defense budget, including the weapons portion of the Energy Dept.'s request, will total $270.6 billion. That is about $900 million less than the national defense spending level laid out in last year's balanced budget agreement between Congress and the White House.
The U.S. Army's fiscal 1999 budget request includes no major program kills and more funds for UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters as part of a $1.3 billion procurement boost, but the service is still nervously watching Capitol Hill to see what Congress does with the supplemental budget request this year for operations in Bosnia, senior Pentagon budget officials said Friday.
Combined procurement and RDT&E costs of major programs in the U.S. Defense Dept.'s fiscal year 1999 budget request are listed in the following table, released by the Pentagon. Dollar figures are in millions. AIRCRAFT FY 1997 FY 1998 FY 1999 Army OH-58D Kiowa Warrior 199.6 57.1 40.4 AH-64D Longbow Apache 421.3 512.9 633.7
NINE CONTRACTS worth nearly $30 billion for production and support of 620 Eurofighter aircraft were signed Friday in Munich, Germany. The contracts will allow the air forces of Germany, Italy, Spain and the U.K. to bring the multi-role jet into service. They will involve over 400 companies and secure over 150,000 jobs. Deliveries will begin early in the next decade. Production will run for over 20 years. Jack Gordon, general manager of NETMA (NATO Eurofighter and Tornado Managing Agency) signed for the four countries.
AIRSYS ATM INC., Kansas City, Mo., won a contract from DHMI, the Turkish government regulating agency that operates and provides navigation to 22 airports, for five Very High Frequency Omni-Ranging (VOR) units, two Mark 10 Category II Instrument Landing Systems (ILS) and 15 Distance Measuring Equipments (DME). The first ILS will be installed at Corlu for military aircraft service. The second will be placed in Dalaman. The VORs and DMEs will be installed at various airports throughout Turkey.
DRS PRECISION ECHO INC., Santa Clara, Calif., won a $2.7 million contract from the Sikorsky Aircraft Division of United Technologies to make AN/AQH-9 Mission Recording Systems for installation on the SH-60F CV Inner Zone antisubmarine warfare helicopters of Taiwan, the Republic of China. Options to equip other foreign-operated SH-60Fs could raise the contract value to about $4.2 million.
A GULFSTREAM V aircraft will be bought by the U.S. Air Force for the U.S. Army's Priority Air Transport Detachment at Andrews AFB, Md., according to a notice in the Jan. 29 issue of Commerce Business Daily. The aircraft, designated C-37, is being bought under congressional direction, the Air Force said.
BMW Rolls-Royce hopes to generate operational profits "around the year 2000," says Managing Director Klaus Nittinger, with help from surging sales. The goal is to boost 1997's DM500 million ($279 million) to about DM1 billion ($558 million) by next year. So far the eight-year-old joint venture has invested DM1.8 billion ($1 billion), and won 500 firm orders for its BR700 turbofan series. The company puts the value of its order book at DM2.5 billion marks.
The European Commission yesterday approved Matra BAe Dynamics' acquisition of a 30% interest in LFK-Lenkflugkorpersysteme GmbH, a subsidiary of Daimler-Benz Aerospace. Tactical missile maker LFK will become a joint venture of MBD and DASA, and "will further strengthen MBD's leading position in the European missile industry," the EC said in a statement.
The U.S. Intelligence Community has identified several countries which have government-sponsored information warfare (IW) programs underway that could be a threat, Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet told the Senate Intelligence Committee.
TRW's Space&Technology Div., Redondo Beach, Calif., has won a $21 million U.S. Army contract for additional field testing of the Tactical High Energy Laser (THEL) at the service's High Energy Laser Systems Test Facility (HELSTF). The contract, from Army Space and Strategic Defense Command, is an increment of a $42.5 million modification to a $131 million contract for the field testing at HELSTF, located at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.
Niles, Ohio-based RMI Titanium entered into an exclusive deal with NKK Titanium USA, the indirectly wholly owned subsidiary of Japan's second largest steel company, to develop, market and produce SP-700 titanium alloy for making nearly net shape components at low temperatures - a significant cost cutter. Critical airframe structures and fan blades are among the target markets, RMI says.
Space Systems/Loral (SS/L), a subsidiary of Loral Space&Communications based in Palo Alto, Calif., will eliminate up to 300 jobs, or about 9% of its work force, over the next few months due to suspension of work on three satellites for two Asian programs, the company announced yesterday.
European Space Agency member states are expected to fund more work on the X-38 prototype of a reusable Crew Return Vehicle (CRV) for the International Space Station, and ESA could wind up paying some 30% of the estimated $400-$700 million cost of building four operational CRVs, ESA's director of manned spaceflight and microgravity predicted yesterday.
Tracor Flight Systems' Learjet hushkit won U.S. Federal Aviation Administration supplemental type certification and the company was also approved for parts manufacture. With an internal daisy nozzle and an external daisy fairing, the 50-lb. kit is designed to bring Learjet 20- series jets powered by General Electric CJ610 turbofans into compliance with new, tougher Stage III noise rules for about $110,000 per aircraft. Tracor expects to sell between 150 and 250 Lear kits.
Due to a database error, the American Airlines and Delta Air Lines orders for Rolls-Royce Trent engines - included in the most recent update of the Aerospace Propulsion OrderBook - were omitted from the OrderBook breakout table of enginemakers' Boeing 777 market share (AP, Jan. 16). This was a significant omission: inclusion of those figures puts Rolls in first place for market share in 1999 and 2001, and tied for first in 2000 and 2002. The corrected table appears on the left.
NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin has said reports that the agency will terminate funds for the planning of future manned missions to the moon and Mars are inaccurate, Rep. Dave Weldon (R-Fla.) reported yesterday. NASA officials previously have cited budgetary pressures as a reason to cut funds for such planning.
The conversion of Airbus Industrie from a grouping of companies into a centrally managed, corporation-like business will open up new subcontracting and supplier opportunities for U.S. aerospace companies, according to Traverse Ltd., a Glasgow consulting firm. Airbus manufacturing, currently managed individually by partners Aerospatiale, Daimler-Benz Aerospace, British Aerospace and CASA, already has considerable U.S. content.
