Boeing Corporation beat out Lockheed Martin to retain its position as the prime contractor for the U.S. long-range missile shield, the Pentagon said Friday.
The U.S. Defense Department said it was awarding Boeing a $3.48 billion, seven-year contract to develop, test, engineer and manufacture missile defense systems.
A team led by Lockheed Martin Corp and Raytheon Co had vied with Boeing to expand and maintain the Ground-based Midcourse Defense, or GMD, hub of antimissile protection.
GMD uses radar and other sensors plus a 20,000-mile fiber optic communications network to cue interceptors in silos at Fort Greely, outside of Fairbanks and Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
Boeing partnered with Northrop Grumman Corporation.
The GMD contract’s value to Boeing will have been about $18 billion from January 2001 through the end of this year.
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Lori Townsend is the chief editor, senior vice president of journalism and senior host for Alaska Public Media. You can send her news tips and program ideas for Talk of Alaska and Alaska Insight at ltownsend@alaskapublic.org or call 907-550-8452. Read more about Lori here.
Tim Ellis is a reporter at KUAC in Fairbanks.
