Lockheed Fort Worth Co. on Friday received a $622.7 million contract for 301 midlife update modification kits which will convert F-16 fighters from the Block 15 to the Block 50 configuration. The contract, from the U.S. Air Force's Aeronautical Systems Center, supports foreign military sales to Belgium, Norway, Denmark and The Netherlands. Also on Friday, Lockheed Fort Worth got a $15 million award from ASC for continued support of F-16s for Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Turkey.
NORTHROP GRUMMAN will develop and demonstrate smart adaptive wing concepts that could yield greater payloads, longer range and decreased operating costs. Under a $2 million contract from the Pentagon's Advanced Research Projects Agency, the company will build a 1/6 scale F/A-18 wing that will be tested in a wind tunnel. The wing will be able to twist itself to increase the angle of attack and lift during takeoff and landing, or when carrying heavy payloads or during slow flight.
Talks with potential Chinese and Korean partners on a new 100- seat regional jet collaborative program could be completed as early as this fall, executives with Aerospatiale said at Le Bourget. Jean-Paul Perrais, senior vice president and advisor to the president of the French aerospace giant, told DAILY affiliate Show News that pre- development of the aircraft-currently designated the AS 100- could begin next year if all the needed requirements among the partners are met.
The House Appropriations Committee Thursday gave voice vote approval to a foreign operations appropriations bill that deleted last year's prohibition against using Defense Security Assistance Agency (DSAA) employees or funds to facilitate the transport of aircraft to commercial arms sales shows.
U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Ronald Fogleman is turning out to be a big supporter of unmanned aerial vehicles. "The U.S. Air Force on my watch is going to aggressively embrace the UAV concept," Fogleman says at a National Defense University breakfast Friday in Washington. Praising the recently unveiled Tier III Minus DarkStar UAV, Fogleman emphasizes his interest in the sensor packages that drones can carry. He also notes that the DarkStar, which has a 69-foot wing span, will need a "fairly sizable chunk of concrete" for takeoffs and landings.
The National Reconnaissance Office's ongoing consolidation of its satellite architecture will continue to receive strong support on Capitol Hill, predicts one congressional source who follows the issue. While disagreements over some individual programs in NRO Director Jeffrey Harris' plans will continue, "there's no question that Jeff's program has very strong bipartisan support," the source says.
The National Defense University graduated its first class in information warfare-yet another sign that the Defense Dept. is exploiting the concept. The 15 graduates from NDU's School of Information Warfare and Strategy were civilian and military officials, and represented each U.S. service branch.
NASA managers set a June 23 launch date for the Space Shuttle Atlantis on its first mission to dock with Russia's Mir space station after controllers in Moscow decided that two stuck solar arrays on Mir don't need to be fixed until after Atlantis returns to Earth. The seven-minute launch window for STS-71, which will be the 100th U.S. human spaceflight, is set to open at 5:08 p.m. EDT Friday, with docking at about 10:30 a.m. on the fourth flight day, given nominal Shuttle performance on ascent.
Second-quarter sales at rocket motor specialist Aerojet tumbled more than 25%, as the battered GenCorp unit-only last week pulled off the auction block-began to feel the effects of last year's cancellation of the Advanced Solid Rocket Motor (ASRM). In financial results posted Thursday, sales slipped to $121.2 million in the quarter, compared with $161 million in the like quarter a year ago. Company executives blamed the absence of both ASRM and revenues from the ordnance business, which Aerojet sold off in May, 1994.
ARGENTINA AND LOCKHEED MARTIN said privatization of Argentina's principal aircraft manufacturing and modification center becomes effective July 1 when the U.S. company assumes management. Under an agreement, a new Lockheed Martin company-Lockheed Aircraft Argentina-will modernize planes for Argentina's Air Force at the center, which is in Cordoba. "This agreement fulfills President Carlos Menem's commitment to rebuild the Air Force's capabilities and to fully develop the aerospace industry in Argentina," said Oscar Camilion, Argentina's minister of defense.
It will take "a few weeks" for NASA managers to decide how best to consolidate the 85 separate contracts that keep the Space Shuttle flying under a single prime contractor. Administrator Daniel S. Goldin was briefed last week on a consolidation plan prepared by Wayne Littles, associate administrator for space flight, and decided to study the plan for content and to see how it fits with concerns raised on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.
Downsizing probably will drive AF acting acquisition chief Darleen Druyun to consolidate the general technical staff activities in science and technology acquisition (AQT) and management policy and program integration (AQX), Mattice says. This would allow the head of AQX to focus on his primary job as architect of the AF's program planning and budgeting, and would move current AQX activities of system engineering, industrial base and manufacturing issues, and environmental protection to the technologists in research and engineering.
The book on the acrimonious relationship between Lockheed Martin Astro Space and AT&T is nearly closed. Astro Space is getting ready to ship AT&T's Telstar 402R satellite to South America by mid-July for launch on an Ariane rocket. Originally known as Telstar 403, the satellite is the last of three Telstar satellites Astro Space is building for AT&T. It has been re-designated as a replacement for Telstar 402, whose failure last September prompted lawsuits between the two companies that were eventually settled (DAILY, MAy 16, page 249).
Not everybody in industry is quaking in their boots over a Clinton Administration proposal to spin off a commercial subsidiary from Intelsat that could enter satellite markets such as direct-to-home video and very small aperture terminals (VSATs). That's because Intelsat lacks a manufacturing capability-it currently buys all of its satellites from U.S. and European manufacturers.
The acting director of the presidential commission studying U.S. intelligence roles and missions expects Congress to accept some of the panel's conclusions and reject others when a report is submitted next March. But "eventually we'll have major reorganization of the United States intelligence community," former Sen. Warren Rudman tells the Senate Intelligence Committee. "I expect that to happen, if not next year than certainly the year after." Rudman took the helm of the bipartisan study after its chairman, former Defense Secretary Les Aspin, died last month.
Top European aerospace executives are accusing the U.S. of waging economic warfare against them, and used last week's Paris Air Show as a platform to criticize U.S. companies' marketing tactics, the U.S. government's monetary policy, and Europe's own inability to join together to retaliate. Aerospatiale chief Louis Gallois took dead aim at Washington for failing to prop up the value of the dollar, the de facto currency of world aerospace transactions, against world currencies.
A U.S. proposal to spin off a commercially-oriented Intelsat affiliate received a lukewarm response last week from representatives of other Intelsat signatories at a working group meeting in Washington. Resistance to the Clinton Administration proposal centered on two key areas: the pace for establishing the new organization, and its relationship with Intelsat, according to sources familiar with the meeting.
Months of talk among Defense Dept. officials about the need to rely to a greater extent on commercial-off-the-shelf technology has done nothing to clarify for industry what DOD actually wants. Industry, particularly microchip manufacturers, still doesn't know whether DOD wants program managers to use commercial products, such as a standard Pentium chips, or whether the COTS stipulation also includes chips adapted from commercial products but engineered for temperatures and humidity levels experienced in military applications.
TRACOR SYSTEMS DIV. of Tracor Inc., Austin, Tex., will convert 36 F-4 aircraft into full-scale aerial targets. The company said the contract is the first production option to be awarded under a previously announced contract, with a potential value of $93.8 million. It follows completion of testing of the QF-4 droned Phantom at Tyndall AFB, Fla.
The next U.S. Air Force deputy assistant secretary for research and engineering will be replaced at the same grade, not a lower one, as outgoing R&E chief James Mattice. Mattice leaves the Pentagon at the end of the month to be the AF executive-in-residence at the Federal Executive Institute at Charlottesville, Va. AF officials are hoping to find someone with a balanced background in laboratory work and systems engineering. At least four or five "outstanding" candidates are being considered, he says.
LOCKHEED MARTIN AND ROCKWELL have created a limited liability company to manufacture and internationally market the Hellfire anti-armor missile system. The Hellfire Partnership agreement covers all versions of the missile except for two millimeter wave-guided weapons: Rockwell's Brimstone and Lockheed Martin's Longbow. Engineering support services, logistics, depot repair, service life extension programs, spares, hardware retrofits and integration are included in the agreement.
That said, there is still some concern about that Intelsat will use some of its considerable clout to give the spinoff an unfair competitive advantage. An alliance of U.S. companies is already complaining that Intelsat's sister organization, Inmarsat, is unfairly cross- subsidizing its Inmarsat-P venture, which will compete with U.S.-based "Big LEO" ventures such as Iridium, Globalstar and Odyssey.
LORAL CORP. said its Federal Systems-Air Traffic Control unit has received a 24-month, $17.6 million contract from Taiwan to maintain an advanced air traffic control system it recently developed and installed there. The award calls for Loral to provide system maintenance and services at four Civil Aeronautics Administration air traffic control centers.
It looks like NASA's Mars Pathfinder will be able to land safely in the Red Planet's Ares Vallis region on the fourth of July, 1997, following a series of successful tests of its soft-landing apparatus. The parachutes, solid-fuel retro rockets and air bags that will slow the probe from its post-entry speed of 900 mph to a safe landing have all checked out, giving program managers "confidence that the spacecraft will arrive safely and securely on Mars," according to an agency announcement.
A pair of first-stage engines originally developed for Russia's N-1 moon booster program are being prepared for shipment to California where they will be tested for possible use on an upgraded Atlas II rocket. Aerojet is hoping to secure final Russian government approval to airlift the two NK-33 LOX/kerosene engines out of Russia around June 22, Marc Constantine, director of EELV business development for Aerojet, said in a telephone interview from his Sacramento, Calif., office.
