Three Rivals Chase Lucrative Space Command Work

By Nick Wakeman, Staff Writer



Show time is about to begin for the three contractors vying for a $1.5 billion Air Force contract to update the service's space command and control systems.

Teams led by Lockheed Martin Corp. of Bethesda, Md., Raytheon Systems Co. of Lexington, Mass., and TRW Inc. of Cleveland have until Dec. 9 to submit their written proposals for the 10-year contract known as the Integrated Space Command and Control contract.

Live auditions will be held Dec. 13-15, when each company gives day-long oral presentations to the Air Force on why their team should win the contract. By Feb. 7, the Air Force is expected to eliminate one of the three bidders and the remaining two will compete in a runoff for the source selection, to be picked later in 2000.

The contract will bundle several existing contracts under a single prime award, giving the service the ability to develop new systems and ensure that the North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Space Command are interoperable with other military command and control systems. Most of the work on the contract is expected to take place at the space command's Cheyenne Mountain facility near Colorado Springs, Colo.

The space command operates satellites that provide navigation, weather, missile warning, satellite communications and intelligence data to the rest of the military. It also operates the ground-based, ballistic missile, early warning radar and coastal, phased-array radar that provide missile warning attack and assessment data.

The team led by Lockheed Martin Corp. includes Boeing Co., General Dynamics Corp., GenCorp Aerojet, GTE Corp. and Wang Government Systems.

The Raytheon Systems team includes Computer Sciences Corp., Logicon Inc., OAO Corp., Schafter Corp., Ciber Inc., M&A Corp., D. Appleton Co., Veridian Corp., Jaycor Inc. and BCSi Inc.

The members of TRW's team include ITT Industries Inc., Science Applications International Corp., IBM Corp., Harris Corp. and Oracle Corp.