The progress of UK avionics specialist Racal is being closely watched by Litton Industries as the US company looks for acquisition targets, reports Air Transport Intelligence (ATI) today.
The Flight Daily News sister product, being launched at Paris as an online news and data service, says Litton managers admire several of diversified Racal's products. Racal has been buffeted on the UK stock market for the past year and some analysts believe it is ripe for a break-up.
ATI says Litton president Michael Brown's presentation yesterday underplayed the level of interest in European expansion inside the company.
It reports that other managers are looking hard at acquisition candidates on the continent. A complete acquisition of racal is not on the agenda, but the UK company is highly devolved and several of its business units are seen as being attractive in their own right.
A difficulty with a deal over the Racal Avionics unit is that it is closely linked with Honeywell which, in turn, is in the midst of highly acrimonious litigation with Litton.
Source: Flight Daily News
