Raytheon wants to buy two defense-related units from automaker Chrysler's aerospace and defense division for $475 million and combine them with the E-Systems subsidiary, acquired last year, top Raytheon executives said yesterday.
Live-fire testing in the first part of the engineering and manufacturing development phase of the U.S. Army's Sense and Destroy Armor (SADARM) submunition program has shown that the system exceeds operational requirements, the service said yesterday.
DYNCORP, Reston, Va., won a five-year contract valued at about $93 million in a recompetition for engineering, technical, operational and ancillary services for the Naval Warfare Assessment Division. DynCorp got the original contract for the work in 1965. More than 400 employees from DynCorp's Norco Div., Norco, Calif., will work on the contract.
Michael M. Sears, who guided McDonnell Douglas' F/A-18 Hornet program through successful development of the larger E/F, was named president of the company's troubled Douglas Aircraft Co. jetliner unit yesterday, surprising some industry executives and financial analysts who assumed a senior Douglas executive would get the nod.
Pentagon acquisition chief Paul Kaminski has approved in large part the U.S. Army's plan to start a program using Aerostats for cruise missile defense, an Army official said. A meeting with Kaminski last Thursday "went well" and the Army's plan was "in large part approved," said the official, who spoke on a background basis.
ASTRONAUT ANDREW M. ALLEN has been named acting director, Space Station requirements, at NASA headquarters, effectively immediately. Wilbur Trafton, associate administrator for space flight and former Space Station director, told The DAILY yesterday Allen's appointment marks the beginning of a reorganization in the Office of Space Flight to reflect the new, more active role of Johnson Space Center in human spaceflight programs (DAILY, Jan. 29). At agency headquarters Allen will join fellow astronaut Stephen S.
Rockwell International is offering the U.S. Navy a new signal processor that it says will allow the Navy to more effectively conduct anti-submarine warfare in the littorals.
Pratt&Whitney will open a new overhaul facility for its JT8D engine family in Columbus, Ga., and hopes to begin operations in the fourth quarter of this year, the company reported last week. The Columbus Engine Center will use 100,000 square feet of P&W's manufacturing facility in Columbus. Planned capacity of the new operation is 200 complete overhauls per year.
The Army has informed lawmakers on its plans to merge the Land Warrior (LW) development program and GEN II science and technology (S&T) program into a consolidated Land Warrior program to field a single system by fiscal year 2000. Land Warrior is envisioned as a first generation, modular, integrated fighting system for a dismounted combat soldier.
At least three "Big LEO" mobile voice communications satellite constellations and at least two "Little LEO" data and positioning satellite networks will boost demand for low Earth orbit launches in 1996-2005, according to the latest forecast by the Federal Aviation Administration's Office of Commercial Space Transportation (OCST). Released Friday, the new OCST report forecasts demand for small vehicles launches for the period of at least nine a year, and as many as 15, depending on which of the proposed LEO constellations make it to deployment.
The U.S. aerospace trade surplus fell for the third year in a row in 1995 - to $21.6 billion - and fell faster than it did the year before, according to statistics compiled by the Aerospace Industries Association made public last week. But that was still good enough for the industry to hang on to its status as the nation's leading net exporter of manufactured goods.
British Aerospace Dynamics will report to the British Ministry of Defense this month on an 18-month pre-feasibility study designed to help the U.K. chart its course for national and theater missile defense, a company official said. Nick Stoppard, BAe's business development manager for air defense systems, told The DAILY yesterday in a telephone interview that the report will address ground, air and sea-launched national and theater missile defense concepts.
The Navy has been putting science and technology (S&T) experts on the staffs of various naval commanders-in-chief around the globe to determine the true S&T needs of the warfighters, says Fred Saalfeld, deputy chief of naval research. "One step forward is being able to discuss with people in the fleet what capabilities they want S&T to provide rather than doing S&T for S&T's sake," he says. Meanwhile, the Navy Labs are trying harder to form partnerships with industry in the early stages of S&T programs, he says.
Despite public denials on all sides, privately some officials admit that friction between Beijing and Washington over everything from Taiwan to pirated compact discs has left Boeing and McDonnell Douglas out in the cold as they try sell China $4 billion worth of new jetliners. Traffic growth in China is strong enough to ensure that U.S. airframers will eventually sell Beijing the planes, maybe within a few weeks or months, but for now China is threatening to unveil an order later this week for 25 Airbus Industrie A320 narrowbodies worth $1.2 billion.
It may take another 15 years, but the Navy's acquisition chief John Douglas says the service will get unmanned aerial vehicles that can linger on station for long periods of time. Douglas told a luncheon crowd at the Navy League Symposium last week that the use of high-power microwaves could allow the Navy to recharge electric UAVs without having to land them and thereby extend their on-station life. Today's UAVs are powered by gas or other fuel and not electricity.
The Defense Dept. is underfunding the offices intended to ensure the adequacy of its weapon systems, the directorate for operational test and evaluation said in its annual report. "The simple fact is that most of the T&E [test and evaluation] capability is old, labor intensive, and not matched to the testing needs of the future," said the report, released Friday at the Pentagon. "The test resource problem must be solved if we are to support the requirements of the warfighters in the new threat environment of the 21st century."
Bell Helicopter's effort to upgrade Marine Corps UH-1N Hueys and AH-1W Cobras to a four-bladed rotor system with an upgraded cockpit is going to roll over to its international business. Bell plans to bid four- bladed Cobras for the upcoming Turkish attack helicopter competition for more than 100 helicopters, Jim Schwabe, Bell's vice president for military business told reporters last week during the Navy League meeting. Bell also will retrofit the four-bladed system to helicopters already sold internationally.
On April 4 The DAILY mistakenly reported that Marine Maj. Gen. Jeffrey W. Oster, deputy chief of staff for programs and resources, favors the F/A-18E/F over the planned Joint Strike Fighter. Oster prefers the JSF over the F/A-18E/F.
