Industry News

Raytheon CEO Thomas Kennedy has said the White House’s measures to support the defense sector help U.S. contractors pursue growth opportunities in the international market, the Boston Business Journal reported Wednesday. “Having an administration that supports industry and going after international business changes the game,” Kennedy said during Raytheon’s second-quarter earnings call. “And we have an […] More

SpaceX aims to launch its Dragon spacecraft on Sunday to deliver approximately 6,000 pounds of crew supplies, equipment, science and research investigations to the International Space Station as part of the company’s 12th commercial resupply mission with NASA. Dragon is scheduled to blast off atop a Falcon 9 rocket at 12:56 p.m. Eastern time Sunday from Kennedy Space […] More

David Thompson, president and CEO of Orbital ATK, has said he thinks the growth in government satellite work the company has seen since early 2016 could help make up for the weak demand for commercial communications satellites, Space News reported Friday. “Continued strength in government satellite activity, particularly military or defense-related satellite activity, should offset […] More

Rockwell Collins has received a $7.4 million contract from the U.S. Air Force to provide contractor logistics support services for the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System‘s aircrew training device. The Defense Department said Friday the company will provide simulation and training services for the JSTARS aircrew training device under the sole-source contract. Northrop Grumman built […] More

The U.S. Navy seeks industry white papers on technologies that can help address the service branch’s irregular, expeditionary and special warfare needs. The Navy said Wednesday in a broad agency announcement posted on FedBizOpps that it may request proposals from selected offerors and award contracts if funds are available. Interested participants must provide information on technologies […] More

NASA will collaborate with a team of space researchers in Brazil to conduct a joint CubeSat mission as part of efforts to study phenomena that occur within the Earth’s upper atmosphere. The Scintillation Prediction Observations Research Task mission aims to observe the equatorial plasma bubbles and scintillation in the ionosphere that affect radio communications, satellite technologies […] More

The U.S. Air Force plans to replace its fleet of 3,270 Humvee vehicles with the Oshkosh-built Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, Defense News reported. Laura McAndrews, an Air Force spokeswoman, told Defense News that the service branch is currently developing a fleet management strategy to determine when and how to acquire additional JLTVs. The Air Force’s fiscal year 2018 budget […] More

BAE Systems has started to build a combined heat and power plant at Portsmouth Naval Base in the U.K. in an effort to help the British defense ministry recycle energy, reduce carbon footprint and save as much as $5 million in energy costs. The company said Friday the cogeneration system will also help the U.K.’s […] More

Huntington Ingalls Industries‘ Newport News Shipbuilding division has secured a $36.4 million contract from the U.S. Navy to support maintenance and modernization work on the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower. NNS will aid nuclear ship alterations and propulsion plant maintenance during the fiscal 2017 planned incremental availability of USS Dwight Eisenhower at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard, the Defense […] More

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has awarded contracts to three industry teams to develop methods to counter small unmanned aircraft systems. DARPA said Thursday teams led by Dynetics, Saab‘s defense and security business unit and SRC will develop counter-sUAS approaches under the first phase of the Mobile Force Protection program. The contracts were awarded one year […] More

The U.S. Air Force has moved its plans to launch two Lockheed Martin-built military satellites from late 2017 to 2018 due to different circumstances, Spaceflight Now reported Wednesday. The Air Force told the publication it postponed the Oct. 11 launch of the fourth Advanced Extremely High Frequency communications satellite because of a technical issue with a […] More