Aeronutronic was a defense related division of Ford Aerospace, owned by Ford Motor Company, and based in Newport Beach, Orange County, California.
The 99 acres (40 ha) Engineering and Research Center campus was located on Jamboree Road at Ford Road, overlooking Balboa Bay and the Santa Catalina Strait of the Pacific Ocean in Newport Beach. [1] [2] The facility's master plan and main buildings were designed by Modernist architect William Pereira in 1958. [3]
The company was established in 1956 as Aeronutronic Systems, Inc.
The company provided major support for the development of Project Space Track (1957-1961).
In 1961, Ford purchased Philco and merged the two companies into Philco Aeronutronic in 1963. [1] It became NASA's primary communications equipment vendor during the 1960s, also building the consoles in the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston.
Its Space Systems division in Palo Alto built satellites, ground stations, and sophisticated tracking and control systems for the military. [1] In 1988, the unit received a contract to build the next generation of Intelsat communications satellites. [1]
In 1978, Ford received its first contract for a prototype of an Army air defense gun system, the Sergeant York Gun. After persistent technical problems and some $1.3 billion in development costs, in 1985 Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger canceled the program. Around 1,300 Aeronutronic workers were laid off as a result. [1]
Many portions of the Philco side of the company were sold off in the early 1970s. By 1975, all that was left was the original Aeronutronic divisions. These were renamed Ford Aerospace and Communications Corporation in December 1976, and then Ford Aerospace Corporation in January 1988.
In October 1990, Ford Aerospace and Aeronutronic defense plant were sold by Ford Motor Company to Loral to become Space Systems/Loral . [4]
In 1996, the Loral Space & Communications defense electronics and system integration businesses were acquired by Lockheed Martin.
The Newport Beach plant was demolished, and rezoned for residential development. [2]
Northrop Grumman Corporation is an American multinational aerospace and defense company. With 95,000 employees and an annual revenue in excess of $30 billion, it is one of the world's largest weapons manufacturers and military technology providers. The firm ranked No. 101 on the 2022 Fortune 500 list of America's largest corporations.
The Hughes Aircraft Company was a major American aerospace and defense contractor founded on February 14, 1934 by Howard Hughes in Glendale, California, as a division of Hughes Tool Company. The company produced the Hughes H-4 Hercules aircraft, the atmospheric entry probe carried by the Galileo spacecraft, and the AIM-4 Falcon guided missile.
SSL, formerly Space Systems/Loral, LLC (SS/L), of Palo Alto, California, is a wholly owned manufacturing subsidiary of Maxar Technologies.
Loral Corporation was a defense contractor founded in 1948 in New York by William Lorenz and Leon Alpert as Loral Electronics Corporation. The company's name was taken from the first letters of each founder's surname.
Ford Aerospace was the aerospace and defense division of Ford Motor Company. It was based in Dearborn, Michigan and was active from 1956 through 1990, when it was sold to the Loral Corporation. Major divisions were located in Palo Alto CA, San Jose CA and Newport Beach. Other operations were located in a number of other states around the United States.
Courier 1B, is the world's first active repeater communications satellite, Courier 1B was successfully launched on October 4, 1960 at 17:45:00 GMT from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The first Courier satellite in Project Courier, Courier 1A, was lost 2.5 minutes after lift-off on August 18, 1960.
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Philco is an American electronics manufacturer headquartered in Philadelphia. Philco was a pioneer in battery, radio, and television production. In 1961, the company was purchased by Ford and, from 1966, renamed "Philco-Ford". Ford sold the company to GTE in 1974, and it was purchased by Philips in 1981. In North America, the Philco brand is owned by Philips. In other markets, the Philco International brand is owned by Electrolux.
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Goodyear Aerospace Corporation (GAC) was the aerospace and defense subsidiary of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. The company was originally operated as a division within Goodyear as the Goodyear Zeppelin Corporation, part of a joint project with Luftschiffbau Zeppelin, leading to the development of rigid airships in the United States. As part of the failing relationship between the US and Germany in the era prior to World War II, the division was spun off as Goodyear Aircraft Company in 1939. The company opened a new factory in Arizona in 1941 which produced subassemblies, including subcontracted airframe construction and the design of the Goodyear F2G Corsair and Goodyear Duck.
The Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS) is a United States Space Force satellite constellation that provides the United States with military communications to support globally distributed military users. Beginning in 2007, DSCS began being replaced by the Wideband Global SATCOM system. A total of 14 DSCS-III satellites were launched between the early 1980s and 2003. Two satellites were launched aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis in 1985 during the STS-51-J flight. As of 14 September 2021, six DSCS-III satellites were still operational. DSCS operations are currently run by the 4th Space Operations Squadron out of Schriever Space Force Base.
Space Systems Command (SSC) is the United States Space Force's space development, acquisition, launch, and logistics field command. It is headquartered at Los Angeles Air Force Base, California, and manages the United States' space launch ranges.
The 1st Space Operations Squadron is a United States Space Force unit responsible for space-based space domain awareness. Located at Schriever Space Force Base, Colorado, the squadron operates the Space Based Space Surveillance system, the Advanced Technology Risk Reduction system, the Operationally Responsive Space-5 satellite, and the Geosynchronous Space Situational Awareness Program.
Stout Metal Airplane Division of the Ford Motor Company was an American aircraft manufacturer founded by William Bushnell Stout as the Stout Metal Airplane Co. in 1922. The company was purchased by Ford Motor Company in 1924 and later produced the Ford Trimotor. At the height of the Great Depression, Ford closed the aircraft design and production division in 1936, temporarily re-entering the aviation market with the production of the B-24, at the Willow Run aircraft factory during World War II.
Project Space Track was a research and development project of the US Air Force, to create a tracking system for all artificial satellites of the Earth and space probes, domestic and foreign.
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Julie Katzman was the Executive vice president and Chief Operating Officer of the Inter-American Development Bank.
While the United States Space Force gained its independence on 20 December 2019, the history of the United States Space Force can be traced back to the beginnings of the military space program following the conclusion of the Second World War in 1945. Early military space development was begun within the United States Army Air Forces by General Henry H. Arnold, who identified space as a crucial military arena decades before the first spaceflight. Gaining its independence from the Army on 18 September 1947, the United States Air Force began development of military space and ballistic missile programs, while also competing with the United States Army and United States Navy for the space mission.
The Initial Defense Communications Satellite Program or IDCSP was the first United States Department of Defense communications satellite constellation and the first stage of the Defense Communications Satellite Program (DCSP). Launched in five groups by Titan IIIC launch vehicles to near equatorial, subsynchronous orbits between 1966 and 1968, they were intended to be experimental testbeds. They were so successful that, by the time of the launch of the last set of eight satellites, the IDCSP was deemed operational and renamed Initial Defense Satellite Communications System or IDSCS. This system allowed real-time collection of battlefield intelligence during the Vietnam War. A total of 35 IDCSP satellites were launched, 27 successfully.