Lockheed Chooses MI Technologies to Help Renovate New York Test Facilities

June 6, 2008

Lockheed Chooses MI Technologies to Help Renovate New York Test Facilities
Work Will Create One of the World's Largest Microwave Test Chambers

Lockheed Martin's decision to renovate its Salena, New York test facilities, includes a contract to MI Technologies to build one of the worlds largest microwave test chambers.

Over the past three years, Lockheed Martin Corp. has spent $50 million renovating its buildings at its Salena, New York campus.

The company plans to invest $11 million this year on renovations and construction of a seven-story addition to house a highly sophisticated chamber to test radars.

Included in the work is a $9.9 million contract to MI Technologies to build one of the world's largest microwave test chambers in a 9,600-square-foot addition to Lockheed's existing radar test facility.

At 80 feet tall, the building will be twice as tall as Lockheed's current buildings, according to Carl Bannar, vice president and general manager for Lockheed Martin Radar Systems.

Lockheed will use the test chamber for near-field testing of the radars it's building for the Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS). The corporation is part of a joint venture with MBDA-Italia, the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. and Lenkflugkorpersysteme, of Germany, that won a $3 billion contract in 2004 to build the system. MEADS will replace the Patriot and Hawk missile systems.

The Salena campus has a $625 million contract to build radars for the system.

Lockheed currently tests radars on a roof, a pad or at its test facilities in Court Street and in Cazenovia.

"The company's investment in facilities is an investment in its 2,350 employees and customers," Bannar said. "It will hire more than 100 people this year," he said.

"We're really trying to ensure we have the right facilities for our employees for the type of work that we do, which is state-of-the-art, leading-edge system design and system production, and ensuring the facilities really match that," he said.

The test chamber is an example, Bannar said.

"Customers who spend tens of millions of dollars on the sophisticated equipment designed and made at Lockheed in Salena expect facilities that are top notch," he said.

Click Here to read local newspaper coverage of the Lockheed Martin facility renovations.