MISSED TARGETS: Satelites Mexicanos says it has suspended a sale offer because tenders submitted did not meet the valuation target. That target was reportedly $500 million, which may have been too much for the troubled Mexico City-based operator. SatMex had hired Morgan Stanley to look for a buyer since emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December. Paris-based Eutelsat said on June 7 that it had tendered an offer for 100 percent of SatMex, together with a pair of local partners, Miguel Aleman and Clemente Serna.
The U.S. Coast Guard is exploring the idea of forming an unmanned aerial vehicle-sharing partnership with Customs and Border Protection, another Homeland Security Department (DHS) agency, the Coast Guard's commandant said June 19. "We're looking right now at partnering potentially with Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and whether or not we can come up with a DHS solution," Adm. Thad Allen, the Coast Guard commandant, said at a DHS summit on the security risks posed by small maritime vessels. Benefits
FOREIGN MANPADS: The House will meet the Bush administration's fiscal 2008 foreign affairs appropriations request for buying and eliminating grenades, guns, and man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) because the risk is growing and nascent U.S. efforts have been successful, according to a House appropriators' report accompanying their bill. Already, the program has destroyed more than 800,000 weapons, 80 million rounds of ammunition and 17,000 MANPADS, they said.
The STS-117 space shuttle Atlantis crew collected one last round of heat shield self-inspection imagery June 19 that is being analyzed at Johnson Space Center to clear the vehicle for re-entry and landing at Kennedy Space Center June 21.
Northrop Grumman's Directional Infrared Countermeasures (DIRCM) system is ready for action on the U.S. Marine Corps' CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters - and the system has been tested on a Dutch AH-64D Apache.
GPS III RFP: Government information technology consultancy FedSources says the Global Positioning Systems Wing will post the final request for proposals for the Global Positioning System IIIA Space Vehicle by June 22. The contracting office has confirmed that the GPS III space segment contract value is more than $1 billion for the basic contract, FedSources told clients. The total value of GPS III Phase A Contract Follow-on is $4.26 billion over 21-29 months. Lockheed Martin is vying with Boeing to build the GPS III constellation (DAILY, April 10).
JETEYE: BAE Systems has received SAFETY Act designation from the Homeland Security Department for its JetEye commercial aircraft missile defense system, which is used against infrared-guided missiles. The Support Anti-terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies (SAFETY) Act encourages development and rapid deployment of anti-terrorism technologies by giving qualified sellers liability protection from lawsuits. During the 18-month Phase III program, JetEye will continue flying on American Airlines and also on an ABX Air cargo aircraft.
Congressional lawmakers are reviewing downwash data for the helicopters that competed for the U.S. Air Force's combat, search and rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter replacement fleet to make sure rescue operations can be done safely.
INTELSAT BOUGHT: BC Partners, a London-based private equity firm, has struck a deal to buy a 76-percent stake in Intelsat for $5.03 billion and the assumption of $11.4 billion in debt. Intelsat's current owners, a group of private equity firms that acquired the satellite operator in 2005, will retain a 24-percent stake in the company. Intelsat CEO David McGlade is expected to remain at the helm of the company, which is based in Bermuda but largely run from Washington.
Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC), Unisys, Northrop Grumman Information Technology and IBM Business Consulting Services have won a round in a fight with the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) over being excluded from the 10-year, $13 billion Encore II contract regime.
MISSILE MARKET: Teal Group analysts predict roughly 776,596 missiles of virtually all types valued at $128.2 billion are expected to be built throughout the world by 2016. With the "bow-wave" of U.S. defense funding after 9/11 likely to decrease in the new term, future growth likely will appear less dramatic but will occur nonetheless. "We continue to believe that declines in world defense spending have bottomed out in the past few years so far as missiles are concerned," Teal analyst Steve Zaloga said.
The next Army secretary, the service's top general and Defense Secretary Robert Gates are eyeing budget plans to speed up President Bush's proposal to grow the Army by 65,000 new permanent troops - a move that could further squeeze procurement and research accounts.
NEW AGREEMENTS: NASA has signed three new unfunded Space Act agreements with SpaceDev of Poway, Calif., Spacehab of Houston, and Constellation Services International (CSI) of Laguna Woods, Calif. The pacts establish milestones for the companies to gauge their progress in developing orbital cargo transportation capabilities. NASA has funded Space Act agreements with its two Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) contractors - SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler - who are developing commercial means to resupply the International Space Station.
Congress looks determined to pass more legislation affecting the U.S. Coast Guard's oversight and contracting for its 25-year, $24 billion Deepwater recapitalization program, possibly curbing or even cutting giant contractors Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman from the primary positions they have profited from since 2002.
ROBOTIC MULE: Alion Science and Technology announced June 18 that it and General Dynamics Robotics Systems created and successfully demonstrated an autonomous robotic vehicle able to carry over 1,000 pounds of payload. Under an $850,000 Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) product contract, the companies developed the self-mobile trailer (SMT), with a hybrid-electric design for quieter operations and speeds up to 28 miles per hour. It also features a top-mounted rack system for cargo restraint.
In addition to the control problem that caused the most recent flight of SpaceX's Falcon 1 to fall short of orbit, the company plans to fix seven other anomalies discovered during post-flight analysis before the next scheduled flight, which will carry the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory's TacSat-1 spacecraft.
BONUS BUY: U.S. Air Force Material Command is contracting for one more KC-130J aircraft for the Marine Corps under a $64.2 million undefinitized contract modification to an award last December. The original award was for four C-130Js (three Air Force C-130Js and one Marine KC-130J) provided by fiscal 2006 defense supplemental appropriations.
Pacific Consolidated Industries LLC has won a $10 million Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) effort to engineer new high-capacity Real-time Optical Surveillance Applications (ROSA), or algorithms and software, to process what is expected to be a slew of space-based data from upcoming military space programs while personnel levels plateau or drop.
