Tim Furniss
A Lockheed Martin-led consortium was introduced yesterday to compete with a Matra Marconi Space team for the UK Ministry of Defence contract to build the Skynet 5 national military communications satellite system. US company TRW would provide communications payloads, as major subcontractor.
BT Defence and British Aerospace Defence Systems were introduced in Lockheed's pavilion, forming a team of "extraordinary talent and experience", says Aram Mika, Lockheed's vice-president for business development and advance technology.
The team will propose a system which can be owned and operated by the MoD - as is the case of the current Skynet 4 fleet - or as a privatised network selling its services to the MoD under a public-private partnership initiative and providing communications services to commercial customers.
Lockheed Martin and MMS teams have submitted proposals to the MoD for a two-year Design study, contracts for which may be awarded in the autumn.
"We believe the privately-funded approach will enable the MoD to obtain leading-edge services and better overall value for taxpayers," says Peter Slinger, deputy managing director of BT Defence.
Source: Flight Daily News
