DRS CUTS CAPEX EXPENDITURE FOR 2003 – WINS IMPORTANT EO CONTRACT
20 Feb 03. DRS Technologies Inc. lowered its fiscal 2003 capital spending from $18m to $22m, according to a document filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (News – Websites). The Parsippany, N.J., company previously said capital spending for the year ending March 31 would be $20m to $25m. The money will be used to upgrade facilities and integrate recent acquisitions, the filing from last Friday said. In fiscal 2002, capital spending totalled $13.6m for improvements to manufacturing facilities and equipment.
On February 19th DRS announced that it has received a contract to design and develop state-of-the-art active and passive infrared sensing systems for the Vertical Integrated Sensor Arrays (VISA) program of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Microsystems Technology Office (MTO), for future advanced military and space surveillance applications.
The program will focus on massively parallel signal processing in focal plane array (FPA) technology, considered necessary to address future strategic and tactical system needs of multi-function active and passive thermal imaging and laser jamming avoidance not addressed with current FPA
technology.
The contract, valued at $10.5m including options, was awarded to DRS by the Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center (SSC) San Diego in San Diego, California. For the initial $4 million award, the company’s DRS Infrared Technologies unit in Dallas, Texas, will lead the effort to develop processes and circuit concepts and demonstrate prototype infrared
VISA FPAs for Department of Defense military applications. The company’s
DRS Sensors & Targeting Systems in Anaheim, California, also will contribute to the effort. The initial award has a duration of 18 months. For this award, DRS Infrared Technologies will develop techniques to stack and interconnect multiple silicon wafers to form massively parallel electrical connections between wafer layers. The approach will be based on years of DRS’s experience in thinning, laminating and interconnecting infrared materials to silicon signal processors implementing the company’s
High-Density Vertically Integrated Photodiode (HDVIP(r)) infrared detector technology. DRS Sensors & Targeting Systems will design and develop a process to cut high-aspect ratio holes in silicon wafers containing FPA Read Out Integrated Circuits (ROIC) and electrically interconnect multiple ROIC layers using thin film metalization techniques.
“The technology we provide will advance the strategic responsiveness and forward deployment capabilities of our military forces,” said Mark S. Newman, chairman, president and chief executive officer of DRS Technologies. “This technology will be important for our nation’s ability to achieve dominance across a range of military operations in the 21st century. Working with a customer known as a technology enabler supporting revolutionary innovation that exploits high-payoff technologies critical to national defense affords our scientists the opportunity to work on leading edge projects that will have significant strategic implications for the 21st century.
In April 2002, DRS received The Herschel Award for its HDVIP(r) technology. The Herschel Award is one of the most prestigious awards offered by the Military Sensing Symposia, and it represents an outstanding endorsement of DRS’s achievements in the development and implementation of its technology over the past several years. The importance of the company’s HDVIP(r) technology to the development of large staring FPAs, two-color and avalanche photodiode infrared solutions for the emerging needs of future missile warning and defense systems was a significant factor in the selection of DRS for this award. Under separate awards, DRS provides advanced FPAs for several significant U.S. military progra