24 Jan 06. DRS Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: DRS) announced the terms of an offering of $350 million aggregate principal amount of its 6-5/8 percent senior notes due 2016 and an offering of $250m aggregate principal amount of its 7-5/8 percent senior subordinated notes due 2018. The transaction is expected to close on January 31. The notes are being offered pursuant to an effective shelf registration statement previously filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. DRS intends to use the net proceeds from the offering, together with a portion of its available cash and borrowings under an amended and restated credit facility, to finance its previously announced acquisition of Engineered Support Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: EASI), to repay certain of Engineered Support Systems’ outstanding indebtedness, and to pay related fees and expenses. Closing of the offering is conditioned upon the closing of the acquisition by DRS of all of the outstanding stock of Engineered Support Systems. Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc. is acting as sole book-running manager, and Wachovia Capital Markets, LLC is acting as joint lead manager.
23 Jan 06. DRS Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: DRS) announced today that for the second consecutive year it has been named to the Forbes Platinum 400 as one of the “Best Big Companies in America” in a special report in the December 22, 2005 issue of Forbes Magazine. According to Forbes, it studied more than 1,000 companies in 26 industries in search of publicly traded companies with at least $1 billion in annual revenues, positive book value, a stock price of at least $5.00 per share as of November 29, 2005 and high rankings for corporate practices. Forbes also studied long- and short-term sales and earnings growth, debt-to-total capital ratios, stock market performance over the latest five years and most recent 12 months, and companies’ consensus forecasts for long-term earnings growth.
16 Jan 06. Radstone Embedded Computing today announced the formation of a new Systems Applications Integration business unit. The new unit joins the Radstone Digital Processing, ICS Sensor Processing and Octec Image Processing units within Radstone Embedded Computing, and is tasked with developing innovative customer solutions that leverage the breadth and depth of the technology, expertise and services that exists within the organization. Radstone has previously announced its strategic commitment to developing both VME and VPX (VITA 46) products, to integrated bridge processor architectures such as the MPC 8641 and to the 3U form factor. The company expects to announce, nearer the date of planned shipment, a range of VPX single board computers – including multiprocessor products – graphics processors, Ethernet switches and Software Defined Radio blades based on the 3U form factor. Specifically, Radstone believes the benefits to customers of VPX will be: Compatibility with VME, Easier migration of legacy systems via hybrid chassis, High speed I/O, Access to switched fabrics, Two level maintenance. Radstone expects that the 3U form factor will become increasingly important in the future as a result of the rapidly increasing demand for systems that are smaller, lighter and consume less power – and that integrated bridge processor architectures will deliver the functionality density to allow 3U solutions to achieve levels of performance previously only thought possible with 6U solutions.
24 Jan 06. Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN) has acquired Houston Associates, Inc. (HAI), a privately held company with proficiency in developing and operating mission-critical networks and network-centric command and control infrastructure applications, and in providing enterprise management services. HAI, based in Arlington, Va., will become part of Raytheon’s Network Centric Systems business. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. “The acquisition of Houston Associates will broaden our ability to meet and exceed expanding customer program