By Andrew Webb
Of the Journal
TECH BYTES: An Albuquerque engineering firm, with help from partners in Texas and Virginia, has won a $110 million contract to support testing at White Sands Missile Range.
Albuquerque's Applied Technology Associates, or ATA, in a joint venture with El Paso-based MIRATEK, will assist the operators of the 3,200-square-mile overland test range with planning, analysis, flight safety, software and information systems development and maintenance, and other tasks under the 5-year contract.
NCI Inc., a Reston, Va., company that has held the contract for the last nine years, will become a subcontractor to ATA and MIRATEK, said ATA President and CEO Anthony Tenorio.
"This is significant for us— it's probably the biggest contract win we've ever had," Tenorio said.
Tenorio's company specializes in the complex devices used for target acquisition, pointing and tracking, and has developed a line of high-tech angular motion sensors used in weapons systems and other devices. ATA was founded 35 years ago to support what was then called the Airborne Laser Lab, a Reagan-era Department of Defense program that aimed to develop aircraft-based lasers that could shoot down missiles.
ATA consolidated several Albuquerque offices to the Sandia Science and Technology Park in 2001, and its customers today include all Department of Defense agencies. It had revenues of about $15 million last year.
ATA has previously been a subcontractor to NCI at White Sands, but NCI recently outgrew its status as an 8(a) "disadvantaged" business— a designation that government agencies use to give preference to businesses owned by minorities or located in areas where jobs are scarce.
MIRATEK was founded in 1994, originally to serve the border-area manufacturing, or maquiladora, industry. That industry suffered a steep downturn in 2001 when China entered the World Trade Organization, and MIRATEK adapted its engineering and information systems know-how to military installations in the area, said its president, Joe Diaz.
The joint venture between the two companies is called ATAMIR.
ATAMIR was one of about five 8(a) companies that applied to take over the contract, said Larry Furrow, chief of public affairs for White Sands Missile Range.
Under the contract, ATA and its partners will answer to the Material Test Directorate, one of several that handle the various activities on the range.
Owned by the Army, White Sands conducts tests of projectiles and missiles— including newly developed systems and upgrades to legacy missiles— for a wide range of clients, including the Air Force, the Army, the Navy and some private companies.
"We don't own the stuff we test at White Sands," Furrow said. "We're the open-air lab for people to bring their programs and test them. With our instrumentation, we collect the data for the tests, reduce it to usable form, and give it to our customers."
The contract is one of the largest offered by the range, Furrow said.
Tenorio said he expected ATA to take on some former NCI employees under the contract. The company currently employs about 150 people, with 70 working in Albuquerque.
EMCORE GETS BIG ORDER FROM DOWN UNDER
Albuquerque-based Emcore Corp. reports it has received a $39 million order for concentrator solar cell receivers from Adelaide, Australia-based Green and Gold Energy.
In a news release, the company said the new order increased its backlog to about $86 million. The solar cell receiver assemblies are built in Albuquerque.
Concentrated solar power refers to the practice of using lenses or other devices to concentrate sunlight on solar cells, producing more energy and using less space and expensive solar cells.
Emcore recently introduced a line of concentrator solar cell receiver assemblies as part of its expansion from space-based solar power systems used on satellites to terrestrial, or Earth-based, systems.
Green and Gold Energy aims to build massive solar energy "farms," using its SunCube "solar appliance" concentrated photovoltaic systems, and also sell individual, self-contained SunCube systems to individual users.
In a news release, Emcore vice president and general manager David Danzillio said the company was expanding its solar cell and cell receiver assembly production capacity in Albuquerque.
ON ECLIPSE JOBS
On March 8, the Journal published a roundup of stories about the stumbling U.S. economy, in which information from past articles about layoffs in New Mexico was incorporated. Eclipse took issue with its inclusion.
The company did lay off about 100 workers in October, after failing to meet expected jet production rates. After those jobs, which the company described as "temporary," were subtracted, Eclipse still employed 1,500.
Since last fall, production has ramped up, the company has continued to hire, and now employs 1,758 people, according to company spokeswoman Alana McCarraher.
ON HONEYWELL JOBS
We've heard rumblings of a round of impending job cuts at aerospace giant Honeywell, which employs about 1,000 in Albuquerque. At this point, the company is not releasing any anticipated numbers.
"Honeywell recently told its employees that it is reorganizing some of its defense business operations in order to be more efficient," company spokesman Bill Reavis said in an e-mailed statement. "The impact to the company's Albuquerque operations is being reviewed, and it is premature to speculate what if any effect the reorganization may have at that location."
Andrew Webb covers technology for the Journal. You can reach him at 823-3819 or awebb@abqjournal.com.
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