Defense Procurement News

Raytheon subcontracted with the small business Sonju Industrial to build missile components. See an article here. Sonju Industrial is a small business and will partner with Raytheon through the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) mentor-protege program. The contract will allow significant growth of Sonju Industrial. This is another example of how defense dollars flow to every part of the US and their significance to the nation’s economy.

CNNMoney has a preview of the upcoming earnings report for a variety of US defense contractors. See this for more. Not surprisingly the outlook is good. The US defense budget remains large and will probably not see any downturn until 2010 at the earliest depending on the US election. Rockwell Collins reported yesterday and they came in with 24% improvement over last quarter. See the press release here.

Alliant Techsystems was awarded a contract by the US Air Force to provide sounding rockets for it and NASA’s use. See a press release here. Sounding rockets tend to be small, single stage rockets that stay suborbital. They can be used to simulate targets for ballistic missile defense tests and experiments, and also support NASA activities and experiments. One common use before the Test Ban Treaty was to collect data from nuclear tests in the Pacific and the American West.

This is not a defense procurement issue but I have fond memories of working with THAAD ten years ago. The First Unit Equipped (FUE), Alpha Battery/4th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 11th Air Defense Artillery Brigade, 32nd Army Air & Missile Defense Command, was activated on 28 May. See a press release from Lockheed Martin here. THAAD is the Army’s long range ballistic missile defense system, layering on top of the existing PATRIOT systems.

According to this article the Commanding General of the Army’s Aviation and Missile Command (AMCOM) is worried about the potential supply of workers in the Huntsville, AL area in the future. The last round of BRAC moved two major commands to the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville. Many of the people working there will not move for a variety of reasons. Major General Myles is concerned that the vacancies will suck people out of the existing Aviation and Missile commands to work at the Army Material Command and Missile Defense Agency. On top of that it is predicted for every government job moved at least one contractor job will be created. These workers have to come from somewhere and MG Myles hopes that local government, industry and higher education will train them without relying on subsidies from the Army. As in the past people will move to Huntsville, like your humble correspondent, to get these jobs, but that may not be enough.

Kratos Defense and Security Solutions won a contract to support the Navy’s missile test ranges. See the press release here. Along with its team member, Systems Applications & Technologies, Inc, Kratos will support surface and aerial target operations. This includes mission planning as well as target maintenance and launch. Kratos continues its support of the various services in the area of target production and support. The contract is worth $59 M.

Orbital won a contract to provide engineering and analytical services to all three US armed services at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR). They are also part of a team supporting efforts at Wallops Range in Virginia which is used a great deal by NASA. See the story here. The contract, called Theoretical Studies and Engineering Services (TSER), will support all developmental activities at WSMR. This range is used to support air and ballistic missile defense tests.

Northrop Grumman has organized a team of companies, including Boeing and Lockheed Martin, to bid on the Army’s contract for a new integrated air defense sensor net and command and control contract.  See the release here.  The contract will be awarded at the end of the fiscal year and will be for a system that takes advantage of new sensors and command and control networks.  There is no word on who else plans to bid for this work.

A great deal of contracts were announced today by DoD. See Defenselink.mil press release for more here. Highlights include a $50 M contract to General Atomics for the Air Force to buy 24 Predators and a $119 M contract to Raytheon for South Korean FMS of PATRIOT PAC-3.

General Dynamics won an engineering support contract from the Navy for support to the AEGIS missile system. See the story here. They will support the sea-based system that recently shot down the wayward spy satellite. The contract is worth $191 M.

The MDA gave Northrop Grumman a contract to continue development of the Advanced Track Illuminator Laser (ATIL). See Bizjournals.com for more. This is Phase II of the program, and not surprisingly, Northrop Grumman did Phase I. The name of the project indicates that this is for a laser system to track and illuminate targets for intercept most likely with a missile.

CNNMoney.com has a preview of Raytheon’s earnings report planned for Thursday. Wall Street is expecting a good 2007, and most likely a better 2008. Raytheon continues to gain work from the US military through their established programs, like PATRIOT, and also through some newer ones. If Raytheon does disappoint expect much of the recent gains in the stock to be lost.

According to this Russian news agency various Czech companies are trying to win some work in the construction of the planned US radar in the Czech Republic for missile defense. The article is here. There is no real detail and is not sourced very well. The article also expresses the official Russian government view of not wanting the radar there.