LONDON — Sikorsky Aircraft is aiming to double its international sales to about $2 billion by 2014, looking for new ways to keep growing as U.S. defense spending levels off.
LONDON — The ability to deliver medium/heavyweight helicopters by April 2013 will likely be key to an ongoing helicopter competition in Sweden. The country is eager to field the helos and have them in Afghanistan by the appointed date to be used for medical evacuation duties, Swedish air force chief Maj. Gen. Anders Silwer says. “We’ve had too few helos” in inventory, he notes.
LONDON — EADS North America Chief Executive Officer Sean O’Keefe says he plans to mushroom the company’s revenues to $10 billion by 2020, and winning the U.S. Air Force KC-X refueling tanker competition is a large part of achieving this goal. Revenue in 2009 was $1.2 billion, according to O’Keefe’s spokesman, Guy Hicks. The KC-X program to replace 179 KC-135 refuelers is estimated to be worth about $35 billion. Each contestant must meet 373 mandatory requirements, and a winner will be determined largely on cost.
LONDON — In response to the pending contraction in European defense spending due to deep national fiscal problems, EADS will need to step up its effort to globalize, says Stefan Zoller, CEO of EADS Defense & Security. Just how deeply the European budget crisis will affect EADS and defense markets more generally is not certain. But Zoller notes that “it is quite clear that European markets will decline or will be stable at the best.”
FARNBOROUGH — Lockheed Martin and Alenia officials say an agreement to build a final assembly and checkout (FACO) facility in Italy for the stealthy F-35 fighter has finally been inked after an extended negotiation period.
AIR FORCE Lockheed Martin Corp., Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co., of Sunnyvale, Calif., was awarded a $34,804,061 contract modification which will exercise the fourth option for Space Based Infrared Systems Highly Elliptical Earth Orbit payload three Launch and Early On-Orbit Support. At this time, $548,174 has been obligated. ISSW/PKF, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif., is the contracting activity (FA8810-08-C-0002; P00012).
FARNBOROUGH — Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter says one of his primary missions in meeting with industry executives at this week’s Farnborough International Airshow here is to emphasize the need to improve affordability and productivity in weapon systems. Carter was on the ground for less than a day on July 19, and met with top executives. He also met with senior British officials to discuss joint projects. He is the most senior official from the U.S. Defense Department to attend the show.
LONDON — EADS and other government partners in the A400M military airlifter program will have to wait a few more months before a new contract governing the airlifter is in place, EADS CEO Louis Gallois believes. In March, the partner governments and industry agreed on a way forward for the three-year-delayed and over-budget aircraft, but translating that into a contract remains to be done. Airbus Military was hoping a new contract could be in place by around midyear, but that has failed to happen.
ARMY Raydon Corp., Daytona Beach, Fla., was awarded on July 9 a $36,355,550 firm-fixed-price contract. This contract is for 11 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicle virtual trainers for the Army National Guard. The work is to be performed in Daytona Beach, Fla., with an estimated completion date of Nov. 30, 2011. More than 50 bids were solicited with one bid received. National Guard Bureau, ZC-AQ, Arlington, Va., is the contracting activity (W9133L-10-F-0130).
LONDON — After several months of seeing some of its NH90 helicopters grounded owing to engine problems, Eurocopter says it has found the root cause of the problem and identified a fix. The four incidents involving different operators were caused by an error in the hot start procedure by flight crew, which caused problems with seals and bearings. As an interim measure, the NH90s could be operated with five-hour boroscopic inspection intervals.
LONDON — Royal Thai Air Force Gripen pilots and technicians are undergoing training in Sweden to allow Squadron 701 of the 7th Wing to go operational next year. Thailand is initially buying six Gripens, with a plan to grow that to 12 aircraft. Further purchases are possible, but will have to await the first operational experiences with the fighter in Thailand, says Wing Cdr. Jackkrit Thammavichai, who will be the first squadron commander. However, he says, “I foresee no problem” in making the case for more aircraft.
LONDON — The partnership between rivals Lockheed Martin and Boeing to develop a next-generation bomber for the U.S. Air Force appears to have fizzled, with Boeing officials now saying they are reassessing their strategy on a future strike system.
LONDON — Boeing Defense, Space and Security President Dennis Muilenburg says he plans to boost revenue by 25% over five years, with a significant portion of that coming from international sales as the U.S. defense budget tightens. Already, international sales are on the rise, he told reporters during a July 18 press roundtable in advance of this week’s Farnborough International Airshow. Over the past five years, revenue from international sales has gone from 7% to 16% of the total for the BDS unit.
LONDON — Full cooperation among all of the nations in the European Space Agency (ESA) on space situational awareness technologies is unlikely because of security concerns, says Francois Auque, CEO of EADS Astrium.
BEIJING — The Japanese ministry of defense is considering ordering a further batch of about 20 F-2 strike fighters from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to sustain the country’s combat aircraft production base, the Sankei newspaper says. The aircraft would replace F-4 Phantoms in the air-to-air role and would be ordered in addition to the 94 that, according to a 2006 plan, were supposed to complete the F-2 program. By ordering extra F-2s, the ministry would protect the industry from delays in choosing an aircraft for the follow-on program, called F-X.
FARNBOROUGH — The U.S. Defense Department expects the solid-rocket motor industrial base — consisting of Alliant Techsystems, Aerojet and their subcontractors — to reduce its industrial footprint, but will also likely provide a minimum level of funding to sustain the skills of the workforce, says Brett Lambert, head of the Pentagon’s industrial policy office.
FARNBOROUGH — Boeing will use the commercial crew capsule it is developing under an agreement with NASA to provide transportation to the private space station that Bigelow Aerospace intends to have in service by 2015, the two companies announced here July 19.
Through fiscal year 2010 the Pentagon had spent about $35 billion for all the variants of the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicle, with plans to further augment those fleets as action continues in Afghanistan, a recent Congressional Research Service (CRS) report says.
SHOCKING EVENTS: The U.S. Navy’s Next-Generation Jammer program has kicked off its next phase by awarding all four competing industry teams contracts focused on technology maturation. The program’s goal is to replace the ALQ-99 jammer pods carried by the F/A-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft with a modern, digital pod design. In advanced segments of the program, there is expected to be an effort to redesign the jamming package for internal carriage by the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
EQUATORIAL LAUNCH: Sea Launch will loft a satellite for AsiaSat under an agreement reached on July 12. The deal calls for a launch in 2012-14 for $105 million — $114 million, less a credit for $16.15 million to offset a claim for AsiaSat 5, which Sea Launch had been due to orbit in 2009 under an earlier contract. Sea Launch executives say the company now has five contracts as it prepares to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection following a recent filing of its reorganization plan.
TEL AVIV — The U.S. is promising to spend $30 billion over 10 years to ensure that Israel maintains its “qualitative military edge” over its neighbors, says Andrew Shapiro, assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs.
Canada is to purchase 65 Lockheed Martin F-35A Joint Strike Fighters in a procurement valued at C$9 billion ($8.5 billion), with deliveries beginning in 2016. Attacked by opposition politicians as premature, given Canada’s Boeing CF-18s will not be phased out until 2020, the decision is overdue, a senior government official says.
