By Calvin Biesecker
ITT Corp. [ITT] yesterday said it is conducting a strategic realignment of its defense segment by consolidating seven separate business units into three larger ones to allow the company to better meet the needs of its defense and government customers that increasingly require integrated and network-centric solutions.
Electronic Systems, one of the new divisions, will be based in New Jersey and combines the Electronic Systems and Communications divisions and a portion of the Intelligence & Information Warfare division. This division will have between $2.6 billion and $2.7 billion in annual sales and will shift focus from separate, point-of-use products to secure, networked communications systems and sensing and surveillance technology that address the entire spectrum of electronic warfare, ITT said.
The Information Systems division, based in Northern Virginia, brings together the Advanced Electronics, Sciences and Systems and a portion of the Intelligence & Information Warfare divisions to create a business unit with between $2.5 billion and $2.6 billion in yearly sales. Information Systems will focus on networked decision support solutions such as next-generation air traffic management solutions, national intelligence networks and cyber security.
Geospatial Systems, the smallest division at around $1.2 billion in sales, will be based in New York. This business will focus on providing networked sensors, transitioning the company’s capabilities from disparate image acquisition to image processing and distribution across the network, ITT said.
In the past the defense segment “talked about” better coordination and integration between its businesses to deliver more integrated solutions but this is hard to do when they are in different locations, Dave Melcher, president of ITT’s newly named Defense and Information Solutions segment, told Defense Daily. “Sometimes we didn’t optimize our prospects,” he said.
Melcher, who has been president of ITT’s defense segment since December 2008, said he has talked to about 40 of company’s key customers the past year and all have told him they want better integrated and more network-centric solutions.
The realignment will also allow greater operating efficiencies and an improved cost structure, Steve Loranger, ITT’s chairman, president and CEO, said in a statement.