Industry News: Contracts (Nov. 2007)

Comtech Receives Government Order

Comtech EF Data Corp., a subsidiary of Comtech Telecommunications Corp., received a contract to provide satellite communications equipment to support an unnamed U.S. government agency’s satellite-based communications network.
    The $3.6 million order includes the SLM-5650 satellite modem, the Vipersat management system, redundancy switches and tranceivers.

Enea Providing Middleware For Hughes Base Station Subsystem

Hughes Network Systems and Enea are partnering to provide infrastructure for Hughes’ satellite base station subsystem.
Enea will be developing a new wireless base station to provide voice and packet data services to the subsystem.
Financial details of the contract were not released.

ERTU Buys Ross Switchers For Mobile Trucks

The Egyptian Radio & Television Union (ERTU) has purchased three Ross Synergy 2 standard-definition (SD) production switchers to upgrade three mobile trucks.
    ERTU previously has purchased four Synergy 3 SD switchers, which can be used for virtually any live production environment and can be upgraded to handle high-definition feeds.
    ERTU will upgrade their OB Vans for the Arab Sports Championship, scheduled for November.

General Dynamics Awarded Army Contract

General Dynamics Satcom Technologies has been awarded a contract by the U.S. Army to provide satellite communications terminals and support services for the Joint Network Node-Network (JNN-N) program.
    Under a $24 million contract from Army Communications-Electronics Command, General Dynamics will provide 33 satellite transportable terminals and two unit hub satcom trucks as well as Ka-band upgrade kits, training and logistics services. The next-generation terminals can be configured to operate over Ku- or Ka-band frequencies and are interoperable with previously fielded JNN-N units.
If all options are exercised, General Dynamics would provide 1,233 terminals and 44 trucks and the contract would have a value of $721 million. The award was made through the U.S. Army’s World-Wide Satellite Systems (WWSS) contract.

Globecomm To Provide Satellite Terminals To U.S. Government

Globecomm Systems Inc has been awarded a pair of contracts to provide U.S. government agencies with Auto-Explorer portable satellite terminals.
Under the first deal, Globecomm will continue development of an X-Band portable satellite terminal. The second contract is for multiple 1.2-meter terminals supporting Ku-band operations. The terminals are IP-enabled to accept optional routers and can receive IP data rates ranging from 64 kilobits per second (kbps) to 18.2 megabits per second (Mbps). Uplink speeds can range from 64 kbps to 8.4 Mbps.
The contracts carry a combined value of $4 million.

Iridium Provides Medical Transportation Communications Systems

Iridium Satellite has signed contracts with four North American air ambulance and medical transportation fleets to provide mobile satellite communications services.
    Air Methods Corp., which provides air medical transport services for hospitals and communities in 42 states, and the California Shock/Trauma Air Rescue fleet are installing Sky Connect tracker systems for automatic flight following and cockpit voice and data communications.
    Ornge, an Ontario-based aero-medical transport services provider, is installing Latitude Technologies’ Skynode S200 terminals on its fleet of Sikorsky S76 helicopters and King Air 200 fixed-wing aircraft.
    Reach Air Medical Services has chosen SkyTrac Systems to provide Iridium-based automatic flight following and satellite communication solutions.
   

Qualcomm To Provide Vehicle Tracking System To U.S. Government

Qualcomm Inc. has received a contract from the U.S. Department of Transportation to provide the United States and Mexico with a satellite-based vehicle tracking system.
    The contract will provide the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration with the location, speed information, trip details, date, time and mileage of trucks entering and exiting the United States as part of the cross-border trucking demonstration project. The system will use GPS and wireless technology to monitor the trucks.
    The systems will be installed at no cost to the trucking companies and is not required on U.S. trucking companies operating solely within the United States
    In May, the Department of Transportation and Mexico’s Secretaria de Communicaciones y Transportes agreed to explore satellite technology as an enforcement tool for the cross-border trucking demonstration project.

SpaceDev Wins DARPA Contract

SpaceDev received a contract from U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contract for work on the High Delta-V satellite program.
    Under the $3.8 million contract, SpaceDev will develop solar thermal propulsion and the bus design for the program.
    The program is intended to develop a space-qualified, low-cost high delta-V, modular solar thermal propulsion system combined into a satellite capable of completing the required missions.
SpaceDev’s team will include  General Atomics and BAE Systems.