The U.S. Army Communications & Electronics Command (CECOM), in Ft. Monmouth, New Jersey, has awarded Lockheed Martin a contract for CECOM Rapid Response (CR2). Lockheed Martin is one of eight contractors awarded this Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (ID/IQ) contract, which provides Federal Government Platform Managers with an acquisition solution for a broad range of engineering support and services. The total contract has an estimated maximum value exceeding $2.8 billion over an eight-year period.

The CR2 contract scope of work includes Research and Development, Technology Insertion, Systems Integration, Installation, Hardware and Software Fabrication, Test and Evaluation, Certification, Studies and Analyses, Technical Management, Logistics Support, Training and Acquisition support.

The CR2 contract replaces the Rapid Response to critical System Requirements (R2CSR) contract put in place by CECOM in 1998. Lockheed Martin was one of the original contractors chosen to participate in the R2CSR program. The R2CSR program was successful in placing over $1 billion on contract between the three prime contractors using both time and materials and firm-fixed-price task orders.

The Lockheed Martin Systems Management led team comprises eight Lockheed Martin companies and forty-two partner companies including thirty small and small disadvantaged businesses.

The Lockheed Martin companies participating in the CR2 program are: Systems Management, Aircraft Logistics Center, Technical Operations, Systems Integration - Owego, Mission Systems, Management and Data Systems - West, Advanced Technology Laboratories, Naval Engineering and Surface Systems - Eagan.

Lockheed Martin Systems Management, headquartered in Marlton, NJ, is an operating company within the Technology Services Business Area. With annual sales exceeding $700 million, Lockheed Martin Systems Management has over 5,500 employees located worldwide providing a broad spectrum of management services and solutions in support of our customers' mission critical programs.

China Mobile, the largest wireless carrier in the People's Republic of China, has selected Nortel Networks to expand its GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) digital cellular network in Hebei province under a contract estimated to be worth approximately $36 million. Network expansion is planned for completion by mid-2003.

The upgrade - to be based on Nortel Networks Univity GSM access and core network solutions - will position China Mobile to increase network capacity in Hebei province by 1.8 million subscribers. In addition, the contract provides for introduction and implementation of both GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) and EDGE (Enhanced Data Rate for GSM Evolution) to support migration to a rich set of wireless data services.

EDGE is designed to deliver wireless packet data - on average three times faster than GPRS - for Web browsing, streaming audio and video, multimedia messaging, location-based services, m-commerce, Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and other wireless services.

Nortel Networks has deployed wireless networks in 17 of China's 31 provinces - and supplied GSM digital infrastructure equipment to China Mobile in eight provinces, including Hebei, Shaanxi, Tianjin, Xinjiang, Guizhou, Anhui, Liaoning, and Hunan. In Hebei province, the working relationship between Nortel Networks and China Mobile dates back to 1995. Since then, Nortel Networks has been actively involved in construction of Hebei's GSM network and subsequent expansions.

Lockheed Martin has received a $20.5 million Naval Air Systems Command contract for Phase II of the Component Advanced Development (CAD) portion of the Navy's new Multi-mission Maritime Aircraft (MMA) program.

The Lockheed Martin MMA solution is a modern weapon system consisting of three primary elements: an armed aircraft derived from the proven P-3 Orion; a state-of-the-art mission system that meets all MMA mission requirements today with ample growth capability; and an integrated support system that provides high aircraft availability at dramatically reduced operation and support (O&S) costs.

Last September, Lockheed Martin received a five-month, $7 million contract for Phase I MMA CAD work. The CAD Phase II award is for 14 months, with work to be finished in April 2004. Beyond that, one of the two competing companies will be chosen to advance to a four-year System Development and Demonstration (SDD) phase.

Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, is a leader in the design, development, systems integration, production and support of advanced military aircraft and related technologies.

The Defense Supply Center Philadelphia has awarded Raytheon Company a two-year contract extension at Anniston Army Depot, Ala., and a one-year contract extension at Red River Army Depot, Texas, to continue the full supply chain management of spare parts. Combined, the two contracts have an estimated value of $19.2 million. These awards are part of the new Raytheon Information Solutions (RIS) business unit that provides a wide range of information technology (IT) capabilities to the federal government.

Raytheon will continue to provide full inventory management services directly to the depots for pre-expended bins and rotation stock using its Real Time Logistics (RTL) process. RTL offers just-in-time inventory management and reduces costs by combining proven processes and streamlined-management procedures with its IT system, Virtual Depot. It reduces material investment, allows for order optimization, and improves supply availability while improving response and delivery time.

Since 2000, the depots have achieved substantial operational improvements and savings in material expenses through lower procurement cost and reduced inventory levels. Major weapon systems being supported at Anniston include the M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank, M88 Retriever, and M9 Armored CombatEarthmover. Red River supports weapon systems that include the M2 Bradley, Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck (HEMTT) and Small Excavation Equipment (SEE).

In addition to the U.S. Army depot contracts at Anniston and Red River, Raytheon EIS has two Industrial Prime Vendor (IPV) contracts at the Naval Aviation Depots in North Island, Calif., and Cherry Point, N.C. Across all sites, Raytheon manages more than 60,000 National Stock Numbers and 100,000 bins with a parts availability rate of 99.5 percent.

Representatives of ACS, a provider of business process and information technology outsourcing solutions, announced that the city council of Carrollton has approved a one-year extension of the City's information technology (IT) outsourcing contract with ACS. The term of the extension, valued at more than $4 million, began January 1, 2003 and runs through December 31, 2003.

ACS has provided IT outsourcing services for the City since 1998. Under the terms of the contract extension, ACS will continue to manage the City's IT operations and provide a broad range of IT services for the City. Those services include operation and support of the City's public safety dispatch system, data center management, help desk support, applications support, network management, desktop support, and other consultative services to help the City continue efforts to align IT operations and business objectives.

Under the terms of a contract deal valued at $3 Million, Navini Networks, Inc. and Liberty Technologies will deploy of the first non-line-of-sight (NLOS) wireless broadband network to serve customers in Panama. The deployment will be the first ubiquitous broadband service in the area and will feature NLOS multi-megabit performance over the entire country starting with the main metropolitan areas.

After evaluating numerous solutions, Liberty Technologies selected Navini's 2.3 GHz Ripwave system for deployment, offering customers multi-megabit network speeds, a zero-install plug-and-play modem, and untethered broadband access anywhere within the coverage area. The Liberty Technologies offering will include broadband data services and is an always-on system providing uninterrupted broadband access, yet is 50% less expensive to deploy than current wired solutions such as cable and DSL, due to its NLOS, zero-install proposition.

Liberty Technologies will initially offer high-speed data and Internet related services to residential and small-to-medium size commercial customers with the brand name WISPER.
Based in Panama, Republic of Panama, Liberty Technologies is the first true Non-Line-Of-Sight wireless broadband data carrier offering services to both the residential and corporate markets with zero-install capabilities in Panama.

Children's Hospital announced the selection of Christopher J. Durovich as its new president and CEO. Durovich, who will begin his work at Children's later this spring, brings a history of healthcare experience spanning strategic planning, capital expansion, operations, product and service extension, human resources and patient/family satisfaction.

The announcement comes after a search led by members of the Children's board of directors and physicians and administrators at the hospital and UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas.

In his most recent post as vice president at The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Durovich worked with more than 500 faculty and approximately 6,000 employees in nine divisions of diagnostic and therapeutic services. Other past affiliations include president and chief operating officer of a professional services corporation at Baylor College of Medicine and posts at the University of Michigan Health System in Ann Arbor, MI, and Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation in Chicago.

Durovich has a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Vermont, a master's degree in healthcare administration from the University of Northern Colorado, and a master's degree in business administration from J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University. A former Captain in the Army Medical Service Corps, Durovich also has been an adjunct professor at the Jones Graduate School of Management at Rice University.

President and CEO George Farr, who has been with Children's for the past 25 years, announced his intended retirement in May 2002.

XactiMed, a provider of revenue cycle solutions to the health care industry, today named Delloise Meier Chief Operating Officer.

Before joining XactiMed, Meier served as a senior leader in several large health care service organizations including EDS, Claim Services Resource Group (CSRG) and Perot Systems.

Meier brings to XactiMed years of experience in the development and management of both product and service solutions for health care clients across the industry spectrum. During her 18 years at EDS, she served in various aspects of senior leadership including sales and marketing, product development, strategic planning and the management of several outsourcing contracts in the health care business unit.

Most recently Meier served as senior vice president of operations at CSRG, a business process outsourcing (BPO) company. During her tenure, she was instrumental in the rapid growth and success of their national claims processing services for health care payers. CSRG was acquired by Perot Systems in January 2002.

XactiMed provides Internet-based, revenue cycle software solutions and outsourcing services to the health care industry. XactiMed's solutions leverage the power of XML and the Internet to provide unprecedented levels of revenue cycle management to hospitals and delivery systems. XactiMed's clients have reported dramatic financial improvement. XactiMed's headquarters are in Dallas, Texas.

Raytheon Company has settled a United States Justice Department civil complaint about a possible export violation concerning a 1994 contract to sell a communications radio system to the government of Pakistan. In the settlement, Raytheon acknowledges and regrets that it erred in failing to seek from the U.S. State Department a determination of whether the radio system was commercial or military, but denies that the company intentionally violated any U.S. export laws as stated in the civil complaint. The radio system was not delivered.

Under terms of the settlement, Raytheon will pay a $25 million civil penalty, some of which will be used to improve its export compliance program, including the appointment of an outside special compliance officer to oversee export activities principally at the communications segment of Raytheon's Network Centric Systems business.

The contract in question was for a modified version of a troposcatter radio system developed in the 1970s for the U.S. Air Force. The troposcatter radio system provides communication beyond line of sight. In the 1990s, Raytheon invested approximately $2 million in an effort to develop a commercial version by removing militarily unique functionality and designing the system to commercial standards.

The amount of the civil penalty was fully reserved and will not affect the Company's financial results. Raytheon first disclosed this matter in its Nov. 17, 1999 10-Q filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Electronic Design News (EDN) has named a Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) technology engineer and two TI products as finalists in EDN´s 2002 "Innovator of the Year" and "Innovation of the Year" awards competitions.

For a third year in a row, a TI digital signal processor (DSP) has been chosen as a finalist in the DSP category. The dual-core OMAP5910 is an enhanced application processor that brings real-time DSP performance and lower power consumption benefits to multimedia-enhanced applications. TI´s THS4302, a wideband fixed gain amplifier and the industry´s first device manufactured in a complementary bipolar silicon-germanium process (BiCom-III), is selected as a finalist in the analog ICs and discrete semis category. Dr. Badih El-Kareh, who was key in the development of the BiCom-III process technology, has been chosen as a finalist in the "Innovator of the Year" category.

OMAP5910 processor is unique to the marketplace in that it is the first heterogeneous processor (combining a RISC-based microprocessor and a DSP) developed and targeted for broad market multimedia-rich applications, including biometrics, web pads, gaming consoles, personal medical instrumentation and point-of-sale terminals. Combining in a single device TI´s TMS320C55x™ DSP core and TI-enhanced ARM925™ microprocessor, the OMAP5910 processor optimizes the performance of both real-time, processing-intensive tasks and control functions. When a RISC processor performs both tasks, performance of each is compromised. However, by combining an ARM processor (suited to orchestrating command and control) with a DSP (ideal for computation-intensive signal processing tasks), system performance can be optimized, with specific tasks performed by the most appropriate device.

As the first product introduced in a new family of high-performance fixed gain amplifiers, the THS4302 increases speed by 3X over comparable devices. With high speed and low distortion, the device is well suited for driving high-resolution data converters for a wide dynamic range in digital signal processing. Manufactured in TI´s new BiCom-III process, the high amplifier bandwidth benefits wireless infrastructure equipment such as base stations and relay stations, allowing them to pack more channels with wider bandwidth into less space. As well as being an attractive alternative to radio frequency (RF) amps, the THS4302 class AB op amp allows advanced semiconductor test equipment to keep pace with future generations of high-performance products that are now in development. Additional product designs, such as variable-gain and differential amplifiers, high-speed ADC and read-channels are now making use of this new technology.

Dr. Badih El-Kareh led the team that developed TI´s BiCom-III process technology - the industry´s first complementary bipolar silicon-germanium process. The development required several novel features to meet the needs of high-performance analog applications. The process is the first to integrate both NPN- and PNP-type bipolar transistors to take advantage of the exceptionally high speeds of SiGe. The complementary bipolar transistors enable op amp and high-performance mixed-signal product designs to increase speed up to 3X while reducing noise by as much as one half. Devices designed with the process operate much faster, over wider operating ranges, and with greater precision than comparable products.

The EDN awards program is dedicated to honoring truly outstanding engineering products in the electronics industry. A panel of EDN technical editors selected TI from hundreds of entries, and winners will be chosen by EDN readers through an online ballot on EDN Access Web site at www.edn.com from March 6 through March 24. Winners will be announced at an awards banquet on April 22 in San Francisco, and then publicly in the special section of the May 1, 2003 EDN issue.