United Technologies Corp., West Palm Beach, Fla., is exercising an option to a previously awarded $214,636,551 firm-fixed-price with economic price adjustment requirements contract, F41608-97-D-0646-P00009, to provide for various quantities of 108 different rotating, fracture critical components applicable to the F100PW100/200/220/229 engines on the F-15 and F-16 aircraft. Funds will be obligated as individual delivery orders are issued. Expected contract completion date will be determined by issuance of orders expected to commence Sept. 20, 1999.
Lockheed Martin will streamline its business portfolio, consolidating the number of business lines from 27 to 17 and eliminating its sector organizational layer, the company reported yesterday. The moves are the result of a strategic and organizational review that began June 9. Other moves include reducing corporate staff and selling non-core operations. The new structure will take effect Oct. 1. The company didn't expect the earnings outlook for 1999 and 2000 to be adversely affected.
Dynetics Inc., Huntsville, Ala., is being awarded a $345,000 increment as part of a $24,400,000 cost-plus-fixed-fee, indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity letter contract. The contractor will define the tools needed to establish a processing and exploitation node at the Army's Space&Missile Defense Command. This project covers node architecture definition, a processing and exploitation cataloging study, and integration of the missile defense acquisition. Work will be performed in Huntsville, Ala., and is expected to be completed by Sept. 30, 2004.
Space Shuttle managers have decided to send the Shuttle Discovery aloft next on a repair mission to the Hubble Space Telescope, based on the amount of work to be done inspecting and repairing its wiring.
Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., Stratford, Conn., is being awarded a $10,075,000 modification to firm-fixed-price multiyear contract DAAJ09-97-C-0005, to increase the obligated 50% amount of an undefinitized contract action to 75% for the modification of five UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters to a Search and Rescue (SAR) configuration, and modification of six UH-60L Black Hawk aircraft into a unique configuration for the State Dept. in support of Colombian National Police. Work will be performed in Stratford, Conn., and is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2000.
LEONARD R. DEST has been named acting president of International Launch Services, replacing Wilbur C. Trafton. Dest joined the joint venture of Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services and Lockheed Khrunichev Energia International, which markets Atlas and Proton launches worldwide, in June. Previously he was executive vice president, international business development, at Hughes Space and Communications International. He has also held program engineering and management positions with Intelsat and Comsat.
British Aerospace is "close to reaching an agreement" with Italy's Finmeccanica on combining the company's missile businesses, a BAe spokesman said yesterday. The deal hasn't been signed yet, but is expected soon.
Pratt and Whitney San Antonio Inc., San Antonio, Texas, was awarded on Sept. 17, 1999 a $25,725,243 firm-fixed-price contract, F41608-99-D-0448, to provide for repair and overhaul of varying quantities of various modules applicable to the F100 series engines on the F-15 and F-16 aircraft. Funds will be obligated as individual delivery orders are issued. This effort supports foreign military sales to Thailand and Taiwan. There was one firm solicited and one proposal received.
About 96% of the U.K. Ministry of Defense's critical systems have passed testing for the year 2000 date logic (Y2K) problem, John Spellar, Minister for the Armed Forces, said following a September quarterly review. Work on the remaining systems should be completed by the end of the year.
McDonnell Douglas Corp., St. Louis, Mo., is being awarded an $18,247,853 modification to previously awarded contract N00019-98-C-9114 for the procurement of two FY 99 flight simulators, two T-45 crew station hot mockups, and one year of sustaining effort for the T-45 ground training station. Work will be performed in St. Louis, Mo., and is expected to be completed by December 2001. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured.
Raytheon Systems Company, Tucson, Ariz., is being awarded a $13,695,026 modification to a firm-fixed-price contract, F42630-98-C-0149-P00003, to provide for the following in support of the GBU28 Enhanced Paveway III Laser Guided Bomb: 173 Guidance Control Units, 173 Bomb Stabilization Unit Air Foil Groups, 173 Conduit Assemblies, and associated data. There was one firm solicited and one proposal received. Expected contract completion date is Dec. 31, 2000. Negotiation completion date was July 14, 1999.
NASA would like to "turn the keys to the [International Space] Station over to an entrepreneur" and move on beyond Earth orbit, but it will also be willing to deorbit the $25 billion facility after 10 years if it isn't being used sufficiently, Administrator Daniel S. Goldin told a California audience Friday.
CUTTING TOO MUCH? People are leaving the aerospace industry, and part of the problem may be that cost cutting has taken priority over retaining talented workers, Jeff Deckrow tells the GEIA's 35th Annual Ten-Year Defense&NASA Electronics Forecast Conference last week in Arlington, Va. This loss of talent could cause problems with new product development and production down the road, he adds.
Scientific-Atlantic Inc. has won a contract from Italy's Telespazio SpA to supply satellite ground terminals for the planned Astrolink interactive broadband satellite system.
NMD TEST: Perhaps as early as the end of this week, the Pentagon's Ballistic Missile Defense Organization will conduct the first intercept test of the projected national missile defense system. A Raytheon-built exoatmospheric kill vehicle will fly from Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific against a ballistic missile target launched from Vandenberg AFB, Calif. The test will be the first of several leading to a presidential deployment decision in late 2000.
BUDGET EXTENSION: Congress this week is expected to pass a continuing resolution (CR) that would be in effect until the end of October, giving lawmakers more time to finish fiscal year 2000 appropriations budget bills. Without the CR, all sorts of problems, including a government shutdown, could result on Oct. 1, the beginning of the new fiscal year. The CR will help House and Senate conferees on the VA HUD and Independent Agencies bill that funds NASA.
MOSCOW MEETING: International Space Station officials at NASA don't expect to come back from a Joint Program Review that starts Thursday in Moscow with a firm launch date for Russia's Zvezda Service Module. Although both NASA and the Russians have been saying for months that the long-awaited Russian habitation and propulsion module was finally keeping to a steady schedule for a launch early in November, new uncertainty on both sides of the program could push back that date.
A Lockheed Martin Athena II solid-fuel launch vehicle Friday orbited the Ikonos commercial remote sensing satellite, the first to offer 1-meter resolution. Liftoff of the two-stage vehicle came at 2:21 EDT from Space Launch Complex-6 at Vandenberg AFB, Calif. Ground stations later received signals from the satellite indicating its solar arrays were deploying as planned, and the mission was declared a success.
NOT GOING ANYWERE: NASA will take advantage of the commercial remote sensing market, but it doesn't want to leave everything up to the commercial side of the industry, according to David Brannon, program manager of the NASA Lead Center for Commercial Remote Sensing at the John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. "It is our intention to get out of those areas where we can buy [commercial services], but we would never want to get out of the research and development of the next generation [of satellites]."
SCHEDULE WORRIES: NASA'S Shuttle standdown for wiring inspection and repair is worrisome, but not as much as it would be once the International Station is occupied, and Congress is taking note. "The issue of interest to us all here is whether the Space Shuttle is being operated as safely as can be expected, given its design," says Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), chair of the House Science space and aeronautics subcommittee (DAILY, Sept. 24).
U.S. DISTRICT COURT in Los Angeles effectively threw out the patent infringement lawsuit filed against Honeywell Inc. by Litton Systems in 1990 and also reduced an earlier antitrust judgement against Honeywell, Honeywell reported Friday. "Although this litigation still has several years to go, [Thursday] provided important victories for Honeywell," said Edward Grayson, vice president and general counsel of Honeywell.
Senators approved a NASA spending bill Friday that restores the $900 million cut by the House, passing on a voice vote the Senate Appropriations Committee language with only one amendment.
DAIMLERCHRYSLER, paring operations to boost profits in automobile, aerospace and services divisions, cut its management board from 14 to 17 members. Among the nine former Daimler-Benz executives still on the board is Manfred Bischoff, head of aerospace operations. Meanwhile, a German newspaper reported that the merger of DaimlerChrysler Aerospace (DASA) and Spain's CASA, announced in June, should be signed by mid-October. Die Welt reported that Bischoff flew to Madrid Thursday to attend a European industry event.
Senate and House defense appropriators left for the weekend Friday with the F-22 funding issue unresolved, but with a new option on the table. Senate Defense Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) sent a proposal to House Appropriations Defense Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.) that would remove $1.5 billion the Air Force requested for F-22 procurement, but add funds back in other areas.
