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News Article
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Defense contractors expand in El Paso
By Robert Gray
Some of the country’s largest defense contractors are eyeing El Paso as the transformation of Fort Bliss edges toward completion.
Others have already doubled their footprint here, while many are still figuring out the best way to do business with the new Bliss, investigating what the Army’s needs will be.
“We’re marketing what is happening at Fort Bliss to defense contractors who are doing their investigations today,” said Bob Cook, president of the Regional Economic Development Corporation, or REDCo.
Cook said he expects that defense contractors will bring 2,500 to 3,000 higher-tech jobs to El Paso.
Last year, Lockheed Martin Corp. did more than $20-billion worth of business with the Defense Department, making it one of the nation’s top defense contractors, according to data compiled by the U.S. General Services Administration.
Here in El Paso, Lockheed Martin operates one facility with five employees. But it says that it has a growing presence, its primary customers at Fort Bliss being the Forces Command, or FORSCOM, air defense units.
“We continue to have a very positive relationship with Fort Bliss as it transitions from the home of air and missile defense to the home of the 1st Armored Division and its brigade combat teams,” a Lockheed Martin spokesperson told El Paso Inc. in an e-mail interview.
Adding, “We look forward to supporting Fort Bliss and their critical missions in the future as well.”
As part of the nearly $5-million BRAC transformation of Bliss, the post is transitioning from a TRADOC post, which is primarily focused on soldier education, to a FORSCOM post, which acts as a staging and training point for soldier deployment.
Lockheed Martin
That’s what prompted Lockheed Martin to almost double its office footprint here.
“The mission transition at Fort Bliss has opened up new opportunities for Lockheed Martin such as the BCT (Brigade Combat Team) modernization, range modernization and renewable energy domains,” a spokesperson for Lockheed Martin said.
On post, the company has supported the Army’s modernization efforts by working on the development of the “Multi-mission Unmanned Ground Vehicle ” – that’s the robot that looks like Wall-E – and the “Common Controller,” according to Lockheed Martin.
The controller will provide data from a network of sensors including the unmanned ground vehicle, unmanned aerial vehicles and ground sensors to individual soldiers via a handheld device. You might describe it as a sort of “Armytized” Blackberry.
Modernizing Fort Bliss’s ranges has also become an increasing need and growing opportunity for defense contractors.
As the post fills with troops and vehicles, just back from overseas or training for deployment, more range space is being utilized and needs to be upgraded.
SAIC solutions
That need has also been a boon to SAIC’s business here.
SAIC, a Fortune 500 company with roughly 45,000 employees worldwide, has 85 employees working in three locations in El Paso, according to company spokesperson Melissa Koskovich.
The company did more than $4 billion in Pentagon contracts nationwide and more than $2 million here last year, according to data compiled by the GSA.
Wesley White is assistant vice president and manager of SAIC’s Technology Solutions Division in El Paso.
“We’ve got high expectations for what our presence will look like here in the future,” he said. SAIC has had an office here for about 35 years.
Right now, though, SAIC is mainly trying to figure out how BRAC is changing the Army’s needs in the region.
“We expect it will have an impact,” White said, “but at this point, we are just trying to determine when that will be and how much.”
He said they are getting feedback on how contractors are supporting the 1st Armored division in Germany. That’s important as those needs will move with the division as it filters onto Fort Bliss.
“It really helps that SAIC has a presence on other posts that are similar to this so we are able to talk with them and find out what they are providing now,” White said.
He said there is growth potential for his division with the investment being made by the Army’s “instrumenting” the post’s ranges.
“That is a good area for us that we think is going to be expanding in the future,” White said.
Next year, the combat aviation brigade is expected to arrive on post, complete with Apache and Blackhawk helicopters. Along with the arrival of more infantry and heavy armor brigades at Fort Bliss, White said they expect the Army will need support developing range management systems.
Not yet
CACI Technologies, Inc., a large contractor that does business here, declined to comment for this report.
A spokesperson for Booz Allen Hamilton said they were unable to comment because they haven’t finalized their strategy for responding to the BRAC movement.
That’s the case for many defense contractors even as the BRAC plan, initiated in 2005, comes to an end, according to Cook, REDCo president.
“Contractors are waiting for the point of no return. Whenever they are convinced that it is all going to happen, then the contractors will come,” he said.
In 2009, contractors did almost $250-million worth of business for the Army at Fort Bliss, according to GSA data. That’s down by almost 25 percent compared to 2008, when contractors did more than $330 million in contracts.
But so far, much of the contracting has been associated with the direct needs created by the expansion of troops and the facilities needed to support them at Fort Bliss, contracts for construction and facilities maintenance.
“At this point, it is a lot of building. It’s a great time to be a plumber or A/C guy,” White said.
Pride Industries, headquartered in California with offices in El Paso, got its first public works contract at Fort Bliss in 2007, according to Pride communications director Audrey Farrington.
The non-profit’s contracts on Fort Bliss support 146 employees doing facilities maintenance on post, according to Farrington. The organization is one of the largest employers of people with disabilities and employs 4,300 people nationwide.
“We are interested in expanding our footprint in El Paso,” Farrington said.
Many missions
According to Cook, REDCo is working with 40 defense contractors. He expects that some of those companies will begin to move or expand here late next year or in 2012.
Cook said that he is out making the case that Fort Bliss, as a FORSCOM post, is going to be a great place for companies that do maintenance and reset of Army equipment.
The post will also have one of the most diverse sets of missions of any U.S. installation worldwide, Cook points out, with multiple heavy brigades, fires brigade, Stryker brigade, combat aviation brigade and sustainment brigade.
“The real value of that, having all these different brigades here, is that it creates a very unique test and evaluation environment for private defense contractors,” Cook said.
That is especially important, he said, with the Army working to integrate its different systems so they all work together seamlessly.
“For companies that are working on interoperability,” he said, “this is going to be one of the most unique places in the world to do that.”
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| David - posted: 7/27/2010 4:12:58 PM
Once again Cook is trying to take credit for something REDCO did nothing to assist in. These companies were going to come to El Paso anyways. They follow their customer from base to base and this is just another transition from them. REDCO has been a bust from the start and needs to change leadership or close shop all together. | |
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