No Deal. Lockheed Martin last Tuesday withdrew its proposed offer to acquire satellite designer and manufacturer Terran Orbital. Lockheed Martin on March 1 had offered to acquire Terran for $1 per share, and pay off debt liabilities and outstanding warrants, which combined represented a $606 million enterprise offer. Terran on May 2 filed Lockheed Martin’s notice of withdrawal with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That evening, Terran confirmed it continues to review all options to maximize shareholder value. Lockheed Martin owns a nearly 28 percent stake in Terran and is the company’s largest customer. The two companies have a strategic cooperation agreement through 2035.
New Satellite Constellation. Radio frequency satellite operator Unseenlabs last week said it is planning a new constellation that will expand beyond the company’s current focus on maritime surveillance to include land and space environments too. The new constellation of 330-pound monosatellites will launch in 2026 and is tailored to monitor a wider range of emissions across all domains, the Rennes, France-based company said. Unseenlabs currently operates a fleet of 13 monosatellites and plans to launch four more in 2024. The satellites are used to help combat illegal fishing, piracy, and other maritime threats.
Saudi FMS. The State Department last week approved a potential foreign military sale (FMS) to Saudi Arabia for training and related logistics and program support for Royal Saudi Naval Forces. The State Department previously approved a similar blanket order training for the RSNF valued at $37 million, which was below the congressional notification threshold. The work entails precision targeting, collateral damage reduction, professional development training, ship repair facility maintainer and language proficiency course, and professional military education provided by the U.S. Navy.
AI Funding Raise. Danti, a startup developing an artificial intelligence data analyst, has raised $5 million in a seed round led by Shield Capital. The company leverages AI and natural language processing to query data in different systems and formats to get answers in seconds, it said. The U.S. Space Force is one of Danti’s early customers and is using the data analyst to “search, discover and share data sets coming in from across the planet,” the company said. “Danti’s technology is supporting Space Systems Command’s TacSRT effort to ongoing events and operations around the world.”
Corporate News. RTX last week said its board has approved a nearly 7 percent increase in its quarterly dividend to 63 cents per share, payable on June 13. RTX President and CEO Chris Calio said that the dividend hike “reflects our confidence that our portfolio is strong and demand for our products continues to grow.” Lockheed Martin said its board has unanimously elected Thomas Falk as an independent lead director, effective last Thursday. He succeeds Daniel Akerson, who retired from the board the same day, along with James Ellis, Jr. Falk has been a board member since 2012.
…More People News. Scott Alexander has been named president of L3Harris Technologies’ Aerojet Rocketdyne’s Missile Solutions sector. He previously was with RTX where he was vice president of integrated missile defense solutions. The Defense Department’s Defense Innovation Unit last week named Liz Young McNally as deputy director for commercial operations. She will lead DIU’s “collaboration with the commercial tech sector and investment community,” the organization said. Previously, she was co-CEO of Schmidt Futures and also spent 13 years with McKinsey & Co. And QinetiQ US last week said that Tom Vecchiolla, who once led global operations for Raytheon, has been appointed to the company’s Special Security Agreement (SSA) board of directors. QinetiQ US, part of Britain’s QinetiQ, operates its defense and security operations under an SSA.
Target Recognition Software. The software company Rebellion Defense last week said it won a competitive Navy contract to provide its Iris software that will be used to enhance target recognition and tracking. Rebellion said its artificial intelligence-based software fuses multi-modal and multi-domain data for target identification and tracking. The contract was awarded by the Program Executive Office Integrated Warfare Systems X through the Defense Department Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office’s Tradewinds marketplace.
Michigan A&D Office. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) last month announced the new Office of Defense and Aerospace Innovation to grow the state’s aerospace and defense industry. Retired Marine Col. John Gutierrez was announced as executive director of the office. Whitmer said that with the new office, “we are positioning Michigan to build on its long, proud legacy of leadership in these sectors. We will compete with other states and nations to grow our defense and aerospace economy, harnessing our strong base of talent and building on our powerful ecosystem of businesses in this space.”
Cyber Cup Winners. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency last month announced the winners of its 5th annual President’s Cup Cybersecurity Competition, all Defense Department representatives. The Teams competition, which included offensive and defensive challenges, was won by Artificially Intelligent and was comprised of DoD, Army, and Air Force members. Track A, which is focused on defense roles and tasks, was won by Army Maj. Nolan Miles. The offense-oriented Track B was won by Marine Staff Sergeant Michael Torres, who was second in Track A. Torres previously won Track A in the third President’s Cup. The annual competition is open to federal civilian workers and members of the armed services. More than 1,421 individuals and 312 teams competed.
Gaetz Challenger. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) has a last-minute primary challenger after former Naval aviator Aaron Dimmock this week entered the race for the Republican nomination to represent Florida’s 1st Congressional district. Gaetz, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, has served in the House since 2017. Dimmock has been the director of the Missouri Leadership Academy in Missouri since 2021, according to his LinkedIn profile. The primary is Aug. 20.
HASC Cyber Chair. Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) is the new chair of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation. Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), the HASC chair, announced the decision on April 29, which follows former Rep. Mike Gallagher’s (R-Wis.), the subcommittee’s previous chair, recent departure from Congress. “Staying ahead of our adversaries in the digital space is vital. I know Rep. Bacon will bring valuable knowledge and expertise to the subcommittee and I look forward to continuing our work together to strengthen our military,” Rogers said in a statement. Bacon, a former brigadier general in the Air Force, cited his priorities for leading the panel. “In order to maintain the world’s most capable and lethal military, we must make modernization and innovation a priority. As chairman, I will continue to support enhancing our cybersecurity and will work to advance artificial intelligence and emerging technologies that will be vital for our success on the battlefields of the future,” Bacon said in a statement.
Cuellar Indicted. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee, and his wife were indicted Friday on charges related to accepting nearly $600,000 in bribes from a company owned by the Azerbaijani government. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said Cuellar will “take leave” from his role as ranking member on the Homeland Security appropriations panel while the matter is ongoing. Cuellar, who has represented Texas’ 28th district since 2005, is also a member of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.
New DISA Strategy. DISA on May 1 released its new strategic plan, which the agency said aligns its priorities with the Pentagon’s goals and objectives through FY ‘29. The new DISA Next Strategy includes four “strategic imperatives”: operating and securing the DISA portion of the DoD Information Network, supporting strategic command and control, optimizing the network and operationalizing data. The new strategy also sets out eight specific goals, to include ensuring the Defense Information Systems Network has a “globally accessible, software defined, transport Environment” by 2030, pushing out on hybrid cloud environments, furthering network consolidation efforts, ensuring compliance with Zero Trust architecture tools on the network by the late FY ‘27 and pursuing a modern data platform for defense cyber and network operations. “As a combat support agency and the premier IT service provider for the Department of Defense, we will continue to provide world-class services. At the same time, we are changing. We are re-organizing, optimizing and transforming to deliver resilient, survivable and secure capabilities to enable department success and warfighter lethality,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Robert Skinner, the DISA director, writes in the strategy.
Amphibs. Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro told the House Armed Services Committee on May 1 that “there’s no question in my mind that we should have been buying more amphibious ships earlier. The age of our amphibious fleet is excessively high, we need to continue to invest in new ships to replace these old ships.” He admitted comments from Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) were right, the Navy has not been able to do a heel to toe deployment of an Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) since around 2017-2018, when it used to be able to do two simultaneously. This means one ARG does not leave its station until the replacement group arrives in the region. Officials recently confirmed to lawmakers they are pursuing a multi-ship buy of three amphibious transport dock ships and one amphibious assault ship to save upward of $900 million.
LHA-10. Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro on May 2 announced the future America-class amphibious assault ship will be named USS Helmand Province (LHA-10). He made the announcement during the annual Modern Day Marine conference. The name commemorates multiple Marine Corps operations that took place in the Afghanistan province during Operation Enduring Freedom. This follows Del Toro’s naming of LHA-9 the future USS Fallujah, for the two Marine Corps battles in Iraq.
Super Hornet Upgrades. The Navy awarded Boeing a $458 million modification on May 1 to exercise an option to increase the contract ceiling for additional aircraft upgrades of F/A-18-E/F Super Hornets. This includes additional aircraft inductions, continued non-recurring engineering, systems engineering and program management support to extend service life from 6,000 flight hours to 10,000 flight hours and incorporate Block III avionics capabilities for 29 F/A-18 Block II Super Hornets. The work will be split between San Antonio, Texas (55 percent) and San Diego (45 percent) and is expected to be finished by June 2026. Funds will only be obligated on individual orders as they are issued.
More LRASM Activity. The Navy also awarded Lockheed Martin a $288 million contract on May 1, adding scope to provide non-recurring engineering and material to support “post-critical design review activities and test asset builds required to establish a new Long Range Anti-Ship Missile [LRASM] variant (AGM-158C-3) extending range,” the contract announcement said. This new LRASM version seeks to extend beyond the current AGM-158C-1 LRASM range while also incorporating advanced communications and survivability capabilities and supporting maritime strike missions for the Navy. The work is set to largely occur in Orlando, Fla. (97.5 percent) and is expected to wrap up in August 2026.
CH-53K with F-35C. U.S. Marines flew a CH-53K King Stallion helicopter transported an inoperable F-35C airframe from the F-35 Integrated Test Force at Patuxent River (Pax ITF) to a Navy unit located at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J. on April 24. The helicopter was carrying the nearly 22,000-pound airframe, under its cleared maximum lift of up to 36,000 pounds. During this flight, the CH-53K also conducted an aerial refueling with a KC-130T Hercules tanker aircraft.
Tech Bridge Summit. The Navy held an inaugural Inland Empire Innovation Summit on April 23 in Riverside, Calif., hosted by the Inland Empire Tech Bridge. This event had over 325 participants from the Defense Department, local community leaders, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, small businesses and academia to examine the state of innovation for national security and regional initiatives. The Tech Bride is anchored by Naval Surface Warfare Center, Corona Division, while the event used FedTech and NavalX to support it. 16 small businesses showed off concepts for commercializing dual use technologies, addressing challenges and technology-focused areas sources across military and civilian enterprise.
Pacific CSAR. The U.S. Air Force says that it has enough combat search and rescue (CSAR) despite the curtailed buy of the Lockheed Martin HH-60W Jolly Green II helicopter from 103 planned production models to 75. The Jolly Green IIs are replacing the service’s HH-60G–“Golf”–Pave Hawks. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall says that for recoveries over water, DoD does not need specially outfitted, expensive helicopters like the HH-60W and that the Air Force is “starting to look at more survivable ways to do recoveries” than CSAR helicopters, which he says would be vulnerable in a conflict with China. The HH-60W Combat Rescue Helicopter “is not that significantly more survivable than the ‘Golfs’ were, or what our joint partners have,” says Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Allvin. The Air Force Warfare Center at Nellis AFB, Nev. is examining tactics, techniques and procedures to improve CSAR, Allvin says.
Resilient Architectures. The U.S. Space Force’s $29.4 billion fiscal 2025 budget request, while two percent—$600 million–lower than last year’s request, “includes a pretty substantial investment in this shift to more resilient architectures so we’re on a good path there,” says Chief of Space Operations B. Chance Saltzman. “It has good investments in operational test and training infrastructure. I like the idea of training our operators against the thinking threats.” Saltzman echoes Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall, however, in saying that the Space Force’s fiscal 2025 budget request shorts counterspace against China. “What I’m most concerned about is how fast we’re able to put those counterspace capabilities to hold at risk the PRC targets that Secretary Kendall talked about,” Saltzman says. “Space-enabled targeting of the joint force is the biggest concern. What this budget needed to do was slow that acquisition down. The programs are still there. We’re still making progress. Were just not putting it in place as fast as possible.”