Hughes Missile Systems Co. has been chosen over Raytheon Co. for a $167 million, 54-month contract to design and develop the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile for various NATO countries. Production contracts will be let following development. The U.S. Navy is expected to buy more than 3,000 of the vertically launched surface ship anti-air warfare missiles.
Participation in a U.S. Air Force R&D program to investigate the idea of transitioning communications, navigation and identification systems of the F-22 fighter to currently fielded aircraft is being restricted to six potential suppliers. In a March 24 Commerce Business Daily notice, the AF solicited all comers to participate in the three-year, $5.4 million program.
House-Senate budget resolution conferees are near agreement on a compromise package that could provide for about $260 billion in fiscal 1996 budget authority for national security-about $3 billion above the Senate budget resolution but $7 billion below the House resolution and its defense authorization.
GENERAL ATOMICS, San Diego, received a $5.5 million contract from the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Division, on June 12 to perform work related to preliminary design, manufacturing and factory test requirements of the Advanced Lightweight Influence Sweep System (ALISS) Superconducting Magnet Susbsystem, Advanced Technology Demonstration (ATD) Model for minesweeping.
Unmanned aerial vehicle programs are getting some contradictory attention in fiscal 1996 budget deliberations on Capitol Hill. The final outcome of Senate actions is predictable, but this doesn't appear to be true on the House side.
E-SYSTEMS INC., St. Petersburg, Fla., on June 12 received an additional $280 million from Naval Sea Systems Command to design and build Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC) Common Equipment Set (CES) units.
BOEING CO. said that more than 8,300 of its employees have accepted an early retirement offer, putting it ahead of its goal of reducing workforce by 12,000 this year. Boeing's first-ever retirement incentives were available to 13,000 workers and, along with 3,300 laid off earlier this year, mean it will employ about 105,000 when the retirements are effective July 1. It employed more than 117,000 when the year began.
Eight members of the Congressional Black Caucus with no public record of supporting the B-2 stealth bomber voted for it last week during House action on the fiscal year 1996 defense bill, helping to defeat an amendment to strike out $553 million in extra B-2 money. The amendment-sponsored by Rep. John Kasich (R-Ohio) and strongly advocated by Black Caucus member Rep. Ronald Dellums (Calif.)-failed by a vote of 203-219. If the Black Caucus members had voted the other way, they could have reversed the outcome.
The General Accounting Office has denied McDonnell Douglas' protest of the U.S. Navy's award of a $1.4 billion winner-take-all Tomahawk development and production contract to Hughes Missile Systems, industry officials said yesterday. "We are disappointed with the decision," an MDC spokesman said. "We'll continue to work closely with the Navy to complete a smooth transition."
After several months of soul-searching on how to reshape its hypersonic research program, the U.S. Air Force has decided to invest $20 million a year to pursue a weapon that could tackle today's deep strike and theater missile defense missions, according to James Mattice, AF deputy assistant secretary for research and engineering.
U.S. ARMY'S COMANCHE helicopter will start a day early on its trip to West Palm Beach, Fla., to prepare for first flight in November. The prototype, which has been on display this week at the Pentagon, was supposed to spend today at Capitol Hill. But House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) refused to support a concurrent resolution that would have allowed the armed reconnaissance bird on congressional grounds. Gingrich's office didn't return phone calls asking about the speaker's actions. Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) had approved the Comanche visit.
AEROSPACE INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION (AIA) James E. Hailer has been appointed manager, legislative affairs. Most recently, Hailer was manager, congressional affairs for the American League for Exports and Security Assistance, Washington, D.C. ALLIANT TECHSYSTEMS INC.
Scarce funding has been identified as a major problem deterring development of advanced space communications systems in Russia and even maintaining the existing systems. At a press conference here last week, officials of the Russian Space Agency (RSA) expressed fears that delays in deployment of innovative domestic satellite systems like Gonets and Signal might result in Russia's space industry losing the vast internal market to Western competitors (DAILY, June 20, page 446).
First test from the B-2 bomber of the GPS-Aided Munition (GAM) was a success, Northrop-Grumman said. The satellite-guided weapon hit its target on the China Lake Ranges in California after being dropped from a B-2 on June 13, the company said.
The U.S. Air Force is said to be evaluating use of U.S. Navy Airborne Self-Protection Jammers on F-16 fighters enforcing the no-fly zone over Bosnia. The move follows the shootdown of an F-16 there on June 2. The F-16, flying without support of electronic warfare aircraft but apparently carrying an AN/ALQ-131 countermeasures pod, was downed by a Bosnian-Serb SA-6 surface-to-air missile. The pilot, Capt. Scott O'Grady, was dramatically rescued on June 8.
A 10-member U.S. Air Force jury yesterday acquitted the senior director aboard the E-3B Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) involved in last year's "friendly fire" incident over Iraq.
CRYOGENIC MAIN STAGE of Europe's new Ariane V booster "performed satisfactorily" in its first long-duration firing, exceeding its normal operating time by 20 seconds in a test at the Kourou, French Guiana, spaceport, the European Space Agency reported yesterday. ESA said both the Vulcain engine, built by France's SEP, and the Aerospatiale main stage performed as expected based on preliminary analysis. The June 16 test lasted 590 seconds, compared with the nominal in-flight operating time of 570 seconds.
Commercializing the ground-based Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) could help cover the difference between the Clinton Administration and House Republicans on NASA spending over the next five years, Rep. Robert Walker (R-Pa.), chairman of the House Science Committee, said yesterday.
Coltec Industries will acquire AlliedSignal's aircraft landing gear business, and Coltec's Menasco unit will form a strategic alliance with AlliedSignal to develop integrated landing systems. The companies announced the deal yesterday, but didn't disclose its terms. They said Coltec's acquisition will include development and production of landing gears for the new F/A-18E/F fighter and production and support of such existing programs as the F-14 and F-15 fighters.
Joshua Gotbaum, assistant secretary of defense for economic security, yesterday defended the Defense Dept.'s industrial base policy that favors the preservation of submarine makers, but doesn't save B-2 builder Northrop Grumman from being pushed out of the airplane-making business. "The B-2 is not the only bomber in the fleet or the only aircraft in the Air Force," Gotbaum told reporters during a breakfast meeting in Washington. "...We need submarines and we need aircraft. But with submarines, we are the market. It is defense-unique. We define it."
An official of Japan's Ministry of International Trade and Industry said yesterday that a memorandum of understanding between Japan's aircraft development team and Boeing Co. on a 100-seat YSX aircraft is expected to be signed by the end of the month. "The MOU will be a forward-looking one," the official said. The Japanese involvement includes the government and Mitsubishi, Kawasaki and Japan Aircraft Development Corp.
Attorneys for DirecTV, Hughes Electronics Corp.'s direct-to-home satellite broadcast unit, have taken legal action against five potential civil lawsuit defendants in an effort to block the illegal reception of the company's signal in Canada.
Allied Signal Aerospace, Phoenix, Arizona, is being awarded a $7,100,733 Firm Fixed Price contract for 13 line items of large equipment components for the gas turbine engines and secondary power systems on the C-5A/B, C- 130A-H, C-141A/B, A-10, B-1B, and F-15 aircraft. Contract is expected to be completed June 1998. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. One firm was solicited and one proposal received. Solicitation began November 1994 and negotiations were complete May 1995.
Canadian Commercial Corporation, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, is being awarded a $6,804,000 Firm Fixed Price contract to procure from Canada's Department of National Defence, three surplus Boeing 707-347C aircraft in support of the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar Systems (JSTARS). The aircraft will be modified to the JSTARS E-8C configuration and integrated with airborne radar sensors under future contracts. Contract is expected to be completed September1995. Contract funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year.
TRACOR AEROSPACE, Austin, Tex., has received four contracts totaling $10 million for production of expendable electronic countermeasures devices. The company, a subsidiary of Tracor Inc., said it got $8.4 million from the U.S. Air Force's Hill AFB, Utah, for engineering development and production of the BBU-48 Dual Impuse Cartridge, used as the initiation device for the RR-180 chaff cartridge. Tracor also received three contracts from an international customer for $1.6 million. The first, for $1.2 million, is for an infrared countermeasures flare.
