Aerospace/Defense Stock Box As of closing April 17, 2000 United States Close Change Dow Jones 10582.51 276.74 NASDAQ 3539.16 217.87 S&P500 1401.44 44.88 AARCorp 16.38 0.13 Aersonic 9.38 -0.25 AllTech 61.50 0.81 Aviall 5.19 -0.81
Italian state defense and engineering group Finmeccanica chose European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company (EADS) as a partner for its aircraft manufacturing subsidiary Alenia, rather than Britain's BAE Systems. The agreement, announced Friday in Rome, gives Finmeccanica an option to buy 5% of Airbus Integrated Company (AIC), which will be created when EADS and BAE Systems finalize the merger of their Airbus manufacturing operations. The option is good for three years, commencing at the creation of AIC.
Russia is moving ahead on schedule to launch the critical Zvezda Service Module to the International Station in July, even as President Vladimir Putin gives lip service to keeping the aging Mir station in operation (DAILY, April 14). Khrunichev Space Production Center near Moscow has started assembling the modified Proton rocket that will launch Zvezda, with completion set for mid-May and delivery to the Baikonur Cosmodrome about two weeks after that.
AJT&ASSOCIATES, INC., an engineering and environmental services firm based at Cape Canaveral, Fla., has negotiated a contract and options worth as much as $19 million for engineering design services at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama. The one-year contract and four options covers master planning, cost estimating and engineering design for facilities, to include final as-built drawings documenting finished construction. AJT was the incumbent on the Marshall contract.
AEROASTRO, INC. of Herndon, Va., has teamed with Space Machine Advisors Inc., a satellite risk-management consultant and financial services firm based in Greenwich, Conn., to develop a robotic microsatellite that will inspect communications satellites during deployment to diagnose problems and help settle insurance claims.
Twenty-seven members of Congress have asked Defense Secretary William S. Cohen to release a Pentagon report on the development of a sea-based national missile defense system to supplement the ground-based system. They said Congress asked for the report by March 15. The April 11 letter, initiated by Rep. David A. Vitter (D-La.), said that while "the Navy and the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization have completed -- and reached agreement on -- the required analysis" it remains at the Pentagon.
One thousand students have earned naval aviator's wings in the T-45 Training System, Boeing reported. Boeing, the prime contractor for the T-45TS, said that Lt. jg Brian Hess, USNR, one of 17 student naval aviators who earned their wings April 7 at NAS Kingsville, Tex., and NAS Meridian, Miss., was No. 1,000. "Looking ahead to the next 35 years, we anticipate that 10,000 naval aviators will graduate in the Goshawk," said Robert Feldmann, Boeing program manager for the T-45 program.
CONSOLIDATED FOUNDRIES INC., which supplies steel and aluminum investment, sand and permanent-mold casting to aerospace customers worldwide, has recapitalized with Key Equity Capital, a private equity investment firm that focuses primarily on manufacturing firms. The Los Angeles-based foundry company plans to acquire other foundries and related businesses as industry rationalizes its supplier base for highly engineered castings machined complete.
The U.S. Air Force's classified YF-113G aircraft was a Soviet MiG-23, one of a series of such aircraft clandestinely flown by the U.S. for evaluation purposes in the 1970s and '80s, not an early effort to explore radar-evading technologies, as reported last week (DAILY, April 10). The existence of the aircraft was verified by one service official, but a second had mistakenly identified it as a U.S. stealth testbed that was abandoned by the early 1980s.
Naval Air Systems Command has awarded L-3 Communications a contract that, with options, will be worth more than $8.5 million for Electronic Flight Instrument displays for the S-3B Viking anti-submarine warfare aircraft. Under the contract L-3 will make 5.5-inch color active matrix liquid crystal displays, which will be installed four to a cockpit to replace older electromechanical devices.
The Pentagon is developing a Web-based network that will "allow people working around the globe to be able to do weaponeering and targeting together in a classic sense," according to Vayl Oxford, deputy director of counter proliferation support and operations for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. The classified Counter Proliferation Analysis and Planning System is one result of the Kosovo conflict, which showed that "the targeting cycle was very, very slow," according to Oxford.
Table details SAR programs as of Dec. 31 Selected Acquisition Report (SAR) programs as of Dec. 31, 1999, are listed in the following table, released by the U.S. Dept. of Defense (DAILY, April 14). Dollar figures are in millions. Changes Current Estimate This Quarter Cost Cost Weapon Base Base Then
Adm. Harold Gehman, commander of U.S. Atlantic Command and charged with carrying out the requirement for theater missile defense, said the five U.S. commanders-in-chief agree that land-based TMD should come first, but that once a sea-based system is in place, it will take precedence. The ability to move a sea-based system anywhere in the world -- off Israel, Taiwan or Japan, for example -- without the consent of another nation "will supercede" a land based system 24 hours after deployment, Gehman said Friday in Washington.
UNIVERSAL SPACE NETWORK has installed a new 13-meter antenna at its satellite Earth station in Hawaii to handle its growing list of subscribers, including NASA's planned Triana Earth-observing spacecraft. The company intends to build three of the big antennas to provide continuous capture of the whole-Earth images Triana will send back from its vantage at the L-1 libration point, where the earth's gravity and that of the sun are in balance. Datron/Transco Inc. of Simi Valley, Calif., will build the antennas.
U.S. industry has a central role to play in bolstering security relations with other countries, says David Oliver, principal deputy under secretary of defense of acquisition and technology. "It is not in the best interest of the U.S. to have a 'U.S. and then the rest of the world' mentality," he says. "No matter if the United States is the strongest military power and has all these...capable weapons.
ARIANESPACE has postponed its next Ariane 5 heavy-lift space launch mission because one of the satellites -- Astra 2B -- won't be ready for launch by the May 23 launch date. The other satellite for Flight 130 is GE Americom's GE-7. Luxembourg-based Societe Europeenne de Satellites (SES) may not be able to deliver Astra 2B in time for the rescheduled flight in July, so the European launch services consortium is keeping its choice of vehicle open for the mission to prevent further delays for the GE platform.
The myaircraft.com Web site announced in February by United Technologies Corp., Honeywell and i2 Technologies will be available the second quarter, the companies said, adding they have "met with numerous potential customers and partners" since the announcement. The site will be an open, independent electronic marketplace for aerospace products and services available to all industry participants, the companies said. They said they have established a new information site at www.myaircraft.com that details future offerings.
SPACE OPERATIONS INTERNATIONAL will offer excess launch space for secondary payloads on Kistler Aerospace Corp.'s proposed K-1 reusable launch vehicle under a memorandum of agreement announced this week. The Boulder, Colo.-based company, a joint venture of Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. and Universities Space Research Association, recently signed a similar agreement for secondary payload space on Lockheed Martin launch vehicles (DAILY, April 10).
WHAT HE MEANT TO SAY: Negotiations between NASA and Lockheed Martin Skunk Works over the future direction of the X-33 reusable launch vehicle testbed are almost over, despite testimony by Sam Venneri, associate administrator for aero-space technology, before a House panel last week. Venneri says the talks are "90% away from closing," by which he means they are 90% complete, according to a spokesman.
NASA is sifting about a dozen proposals from media outlets for commercial activities on the International Space Station, and expects to begin awarding cooperative agreements over the coming month, says Joe Rothenberg, associate administrator for space flight. But it seems the closed-door discussions with bidders are not going smoothly. The space agency has yet to nail down specific award dates, and now Congress is getting some calls from multimedia companies unhappy with the way the source selection is going.
HUGHES GLOBAL SERVICES (HGS) has been authorized to provide Intelsat services direct to U.S. government customers under the FCC's direct access order, expanding the company's offerings under its General Services Administration Federal Technology Service contract. The contract offers U.S. government users single-point access to satellite services including mobile satellite telephony and data messaging, VSAT networks, video teleconferencing and bandwidth on the HGS-1 satellite.
Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. and Keystone Helicopter Corp. announced an agreement under which Keystone will complete Sikorsky S-76 at its plant in West Chester, Pa. Sikorsky said it is part of an overall restructuring of commercial programs to improve competitiveness and customer satisfaction. Keystone already has years of experience in modifying, updating, completing, overhauling and operating the S-76.
House and Senate budget negotiators reached agreement yesterday on a congressional budget resolution that provides $309.9 billion for national defense in fiscal 2101, congressional sources said.
National Transportation Safety Board has asked FAA to review its procedures for ensuring that air traffic controllers report operational errors. The recommendation stems from the near-collision of a Piper Navajo and a Navy Grumman E-2 on June 23, 1998, near Bradford, Pa., under control of the Cleveland Air Route Traffic Control Center. But the board suspects the non-reporting problem to be more widespread.
