Litton Wins 2 Federal Contracts for $70 Million

Litton Industries Inc., a Woodland Hills defense electronics and shipbuilding concern, has won two government contracts worth a total of about $70 million.

The U.S. Navy awarded Litton’s Ingalls Shipbuilding division in Pascagoula, Miss., a $55.9-million contract to continue providing technical and engineering services during the current fiscal year for the Ticonderoga class Aegis cruisers and Spruance and Kidd class destroyers. Ingalls built most of the 62 ships, which are among the Navy’s most advanced surface combat vessels.

Also, Litton’s Guidance and Control Systems division in Woodland Hills won a $13.6-million U.S. Air Force contract to continue development of a next-generation guidance system for long-range strategic missiles. Litton won the contract, with team member Hughes Electro-Optical Systems, over a competing Lockheed Martin / Honeywell team.

The guidance system will combine laser gyros and star-tracking technologies, which will allow the missiles to fly with extremely high accuracy for thousands of miles, Litton said. The systems will be delivered in the summer of 1997, company officials said, and could lead to hundreds of millions of dollars in engineering and manufacturing work during the next decade.