Lockheed Martin's Russian-powered Atlas IIIA rocket is set for its inaugural flight May 15, while Boeing's new Delta III has been cleared for a return to flight following completion of engine testing. The Atlas III, an interim step in Lockheed Martin's Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) development process, will carry Eutelsat's W4 telecommunications satellite to orbit from Cape Canaveral Air Station, Fla.
Russia launched a Progress capsule to the Mir orbital station yesterday afternoon to resupply the two cosmonauts who are rehabilitating the 14-year-old spacecraft for possible commercial activities. Liftoff of Progress M1-2 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan came at 4:07 p.m. EDT, according to MirCorp, the private venture seeking to keep Mir in orbit as a business. Progress M1-2 is set to dock at the Kvant module port at 5:30 p.m. EDT tomorrow.
Lockheed Martin reported earnings of $54 million, or $0.12 per share, in the first quarter of 2000, excluding nonrecurring and unusual items - turning in results that beat analyst consensus estimates by $0.02 a share and demonstrated solid strides in debt reduction and cash management in the quarter. Sales, however, were off 10%.
Boeing said it has begun flight tests of its F-22 Block 3S avionics software package, keeping the program on track for a November software delivery. The Block 3S avionics, a precursor to the Block 3.0 software, is being evaluated on the company's 757 flying test bed (FTB) to evaluate radar, electronic warfare and communication, navigation and identification sensors in an airborne environment.
BOEING hopes to get its strike-delayed jetliner deliveries back on track by the end of the second quarter, says Boeing Commercial Airplanes President Alan Mulally, and the company is working with airlines to keep any late-delivery penalties to a minimum. The company expected to deliver 125 airplanes during the first quarter, but delivered only 75 thanks to the 40-day walkout by unionized engineers and technicians. As of yesterday, the company has caught up to about 115 planes, Mulally said.
Luxembourg's Societe Europeenne des Satellites (SES) reported group revenues of 725.2 million euros in 1999, a rise of 40.3%, according to company accounts approved last week by SES shareholders. Group operating profit rose 45.7%, to 407 million euros, while earnings per share were up 14.2% to 5.41 euros. The shareholders approved a dividend of 2.60 euros per share, which will be paid to holders of SES A-shares on April 28.
Lockheed Martin's Sanders unit said it has completed preliminary airworthiness evaluation of the Advanced Threat Infrared Countermeasures/Common Missile Warning System (ATIRCM/CMWS) on a U.S. Army EH-60 helicopter. The tests, completed April 10, were a prerequisite for contractor flight testing, slated to begin in June at Sanders' facilities in Merrimack, N.H., the company said.
Envisat, Europe's big new environmental radar satellite, is undergoing integration and testing at the European Space Agency's European Space research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in the Netherlands, ESA announced. Weighing more than eight tonnes, the payload module is being attached to the service module to produce a spacecraft measuring more than 10 meters tall. Envisat is scheduled for launch in June 2001 aboard an Ariane 5 rocket.
The High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) was successfully tested recently at White Sands Missile Range, N.M. The system fired a six-round ripple of Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) rockets, according to Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, Dallas, maker of both the launcher and rocket. HIMARS is designed to fire MLRS and Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) munitions and fit with the Army's lighter, more lethal force structure.
Northrop Grumman's California Microwave Systems unit is working under a $3 million U.S. Army contract to upgrade the airborne sensors on three RC-7B Airborne Reconnaissance Low-Multifunction (ARL-M) aircraft. The Army uses the aircraft, a modified four-engine de Havilland DHC-7, for reconnaissance and surveillance. It carries imagery, radar, communications intelligence, data links and communications systems, which send near real-time intelligence products to a tactical commander.
Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright explained to the United Nations that the national missile defense system the U.S. is designed is to defeat a small attack, and should therefore not be a threat to Russia. "Please remember that we are talking about a system capable of defending against, at most, a few tens of incoming missiles," she said in a statement before the Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference at the United Nations in New York on Monday. "It is not intended to degrade Russia's deterrent. Nor will it have that result."
A Congressional Budget Office estimate that the proposed National Missile Defense (NMD) would cost almost $60 billion through 2015 was reached by "a comparison of apples to golden apples," the chief Defense Dept. spokesman charged yesterday. "The CBO reports details more of a robust system than we have costed out at this stage," Ken Bacon told reporters asking about the CBO report, "Budgetary and Technical Implications of the Administration's Plan for National Missile Defense," which was released yesterday.
Stiff crosswinds at Kennedy Space Center, Fla., forced a second delay in launch of the Space Shuttle Atlantis on a 10-day mission to service and stock the International Space Station, but more favorable conditions are forecast today. Launch mangers scrubbed the planned 3:53 p.m. EDT launch shortly after 2 p.m. yesterday, when winds at the Florida launch facility were gusting to more than 34 mph. That is above the level permitted both for launch and for an emergency landing at the KSC landing strip in the event of a problem on ascent.
Northrop Grumman and Germany's DaimlerChrysler Aerospace (DASA) said they are teaming to evaluate strategic areas of cooperation, particularly in advanced technologies for surveillance and reconnaissance.
Northrop Grumman Corp. reported a 66% jump in net income for the first quarter of 2000 compared to the same period a year ago. Sales were essentially unchanged, but operating margin increased 45%. Net income rose to $173 million, or $2.47 per share, a 66% jump from the $104 million or $1.50 per share reported for the first quarter of 1999, before the cumulative effect of an accounting change, the company said yesterday.
Superconductor Technologies, Inc., Santa Barbara, Calif., is being awarded a $3,400,000 increment as part of a $13,623,618 cost plus fixed fee contract to explore three approaches to develop high-Q, electromechanically tunable, HTS filters. Work will be performed in Santa Barbara, Calif., and is expected to be completed by Sept. 22, 2000. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. A Broad Agency Announcement was issued on Oct. 5, 1999, and 5 bids were received.
CHELLO BROADBAND, a top European broadband Internet service provider, has picked CyberStar's satellite-based Internet Protocol (IP) network to deliver Internet access and content to about 300,000 subscribers across Australia. The service, attached to pay-TV subscriptions, allows Australians who live outside major cities access to the Internet at 256 kilobits per second. Over the next three years chello plans to use CyberStar to begin delivering similar service elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region, and in Latin America and Europe as well.
Regents of New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, N.M., and Clark Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga., are each being awarded an indefinite quantity/indefinite delivery firm fixed price contract, DAAB07-00-D0504 and DAAB07-00-D-0505 respectively, together valued at $50,000,000 for support for the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command, Ft. Monmouth, N.J. to include the Research, Development and Engineering Center and the Logistics Readiness Center; and the U.S. Army Information Systems Engineering Command, Ft. Huachua, Ariz.
LITHIUM POWER TECHNOLOGIES INC., Manvel, Tex., said an award from the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization's Small Business Innovation Research program enables it to direct $750,000 in research funds to refine its thin-film, rechargeable lithium solid-state battery system. Zafar A. Munshi, president and CEO of Lithium Power, said the award "indicates that BMDO recognizes the innovation and potential of our battery design. Not only will this contract support our government's defense needs but, once commercialized, this battery will open new
MIRCORP reports the slow leak aboard Russia's Mir orbital station has been found and apparently sealed. If true, the development removes another question mark about the ability of the 14-year-old spacecraft to support commercial activities. Mir's cosmonaut crew found the leak in a hatch leading to the Spektr module, unpressurized since it was smashed by a runaway Progress capsule in June 1997 (DAILY, June 26, 30, 1997).
ORBITAL SCIENCES CORP. won a $13 million contract from Singapore Bus Services Ltd. (SBS) for a satellite-based Automatic Vehicle Management System to track a fleet of 2,700 vehicles. The Dulles, Va.-based company will also equip 25 dispatch stations. Sanyo Trading company will install Orbital in-vehicle units in the SBS vehicles under a $6.5 million contract, bringing the total cost of the upgrade to $19.5 million. Orbital's Transportation Management Systems Div. will handle the contract for the U.S. company, in partnership with Sanyo.
Northrop Grumman Corp., Rolling Meadows, Ill., is being awarded a $24,500,000 firm-fixed-price contract to provide for 15 Low Altitude Infrared Targeting and Navigating II pods applicable to the AV-8B aircraft. This effort supports Marine Corps requirements (9 pods), and foreign military sales to Italy (4 pods), and Spain (2 pods). This work will be performed at Northrop Grumman, Rolling Meadows, Ill. (55%) and at Rafael Missile Division, Haifa, Israel (45%). The work is expected to be completed March 2002.
Lucent Technologies said yesterday that it has hired Boeing Chief Financial Officer Deborah C. Hopkins as its executive vice president and chief financial officer, effective immediately. Hopkins, 45, replaces Donald K. Peterson, who has become chief executive officer of the new Enterprise Networks Group that Lucent intends to spin off later this year.
