Defense Department contracts could bring up to $100 million in business to local companies

Posted on December 29, 2011

Up to $100 million worth of business could come to defense contractors with headquarters or divisions and operations based in Southeast Michigan, under a round of new contract awards announced by the U.S. Department of Defense.

Ypsilanti-based Kalitta Air LLC is one of at least seven companies in the United Parcel Service Contractor Team that will share in an annual contract award from the U.S. Transportation Command Directorate of Acquisition at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois. The companies will provide supplemental passenger and cargo transport for the military through September.

That contract has a ceiling value of $181 million and a floor value of just over $87.9 million, compared with a floor value of $30.5 million and 10 companies named in last year’s award.

The annual contract is to provide supplemental passenger and cargo transport for the military. It is unrelated to a $12.6 million contract that sister company Kalitta Charters LLC received in September to transport the remains of service members from Iraq and Afghanistan out of Dover Air Force Base.

Sterling Heights-based General Dynamics Land Systems also received a $59.9 million contract award from the U.S. Army Tacom Life Cycle Management Command in Warren. That award is for the Army to procure system enhancement packages to modify the M1A2 Abrams battle tank, along with remote operated weapon stations, through June 2013.

Raytheon Co. expects to source 19 percent of its work under a new $49 million contract at an engineering and professional services office in Commerce Township. The Waltham, Mass.-based contractor expects to perform unscheduled maintenance, flight anomaly analysis, engineering support services and recertification on 50-200 Tomahawk missiles by January 2013 under a contract with the Naval Air Systems Command in Maryland. Most of that work is be sourced in Arizona.

Tacom in Warren also announced last week that it had awarded a $10.3 million contract to Oshkosh Corp., which has a technical center in Warren for subsidiary Oshkosh Defense. The contract calls for Oshkosh to supply 465 rocket-propelled grenade “Net Delta” kits for its fleet of Mine Resistant Ambush Protected All-Terrain Vehicles.