Pentagon nuclear arsenal modernization prime Northrop Grumman exceeded expectations with its third-quarter earnings Wednesday, posting a 10-percent earnings increase over the year-ago quarter on a 6-percent rise in quarterly revenue.
Earnings per share of $3.68 beat the Wall Street consensus of $2.90, as reported by the website MarketWatch, while revenue in the quarter ended Sept. 30 rose to just over $6.5 billion: $200 million above the analyst consensus.
During the quarter just ended, Boeing and Northrop Grumman secured contracts to mature technology for a next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) system that will replace the aging, nuclear-tipped Minuteman III. Northrop’s is worth almost $330 million over three years. The Air Force plans to select a single ICBM contractor in 2020, with a solicitation for the work set to appear in 2019.
The U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile fleet is armed with W-78 and W87 warheads furnished by DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration. Sometime in the 2030s, the ICBM fleet would transition to the yet-to-be-built family of interoperable warheads.
Also during the quarter, Northrop announced it would acquire medium-sized aerospace and defense contractor Orbital ATK, of Dulles, Va. The move give the Falls Church, Va.-based aerospace giant a stake in Consolidated Nuclear Security: DOE’s prime contractor for the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., and the Pantex Plant weapons assembly and disassembly facility near Amarillo, Texas.
That would somewhat balance the company’s exit from the Nevada National Security Site this year. Northrop Grumman is a member of site prime National Security Technologies and partnered in a bid to keep the contract, but ultimately lost to Honeywell-led Mission Support and Test Services.
