Northrop Grumman Wins $450M Joint Threat Emitter Support Deal

Northrop Grumman Corp.’s (NYSE:NOC) subsidiary, Northrop Grumman Amherst Systems recently secured a $450-million Foreign Military Sales deal for providing U.S. agencies and other countries with end items, spares, support equipment, testing and training related to its Joint Threat Emitter.

The contract was awarded by the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Hill Air Force Base, Utah. Work related to the deal will be performed in Buffalo, NY along with other locations within and outside the United States. This contract involves foreign military sales to U.S. partner countries and is expected to be completed by Dec 5, 2025.

A Brief Note on Joint Threat Emitter (JTE)

Northrop Grumman’s Joint Threat Emitter is a mobile air defense threat simulator that enables aircrews to train in threat environments matching actual combat conditions. Each of these radar and satellite-based systems can simulate up to six threat systems, and integrate and control multiple JTEs in a coordinated manner to simulate hostile Integrated Air Defense Systems (IADS). It also helps assess the performance of Aircraft Radar Warning Receiver (RWR) and Electronic Countermeasure (ECM) Systems.

Northrop Grumman’s FMS Scenario

Northrop Grumman, being one of the major defense companies in the United States, enjoys a heavy inflow of international orders. The company had Foreign Military Sales of $1,099 million in the third quarter of 2018. Further, its total international sales have witnessed a year-over-year improvement of 27%. We, therefore, expect the aforementioned contract to improve FMS prospects, going forward.

What Favors Northrop Grumman?

Northrop Grumman’s Mission Systems unit, which manufactures complex radar systems, reported third-quarter 2018 revenues of $2.91 billion that moved up 2.6% year over year. We believe that the latest contract along with other notable contracts will further allow the company’s Mission Systems unit to reflect similar solid results in the upcoming quarters.

Interestingly, per Hexa Research, the global military radar systems market is anticipated to reach $14.46 billion by 2024, primarily owing to the rising need for improving safety and security on borders due to rising geo-political tensions and conflicts among neighboring nations. Such projections should benefit Northrop Grumman’s Amherst Systems, as the company extensively focuses on technological advancements, and upgrading its radar and satellite systems.

Price Movement

Shares of Northrop Grumman have declined about 9.5% in a month’s time compared with the industry’s decline of 9%.

Zacks Rank & Key Picks

Northrop Grumman currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

A few better-ranked companies in the same sector are Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings (NYSE:AJRD) . Raytheon Company (NYSE:RTN) and The Boeing Company (NYSE:BA) .

While Aerojet Rocketdyne sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), Raytheon and Boeing carry a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Aerojet Rocketdyne came up with average positive earnings surprise of 19.27% in the last four quarters. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2018 earnings has increased 43.3% to $1.82 in the past 90 days.

Raytheon delivered average positive earnings surprise of 6.71% in the last four quarters. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2018 earnings has moved up 1.7% to $10.10 cents in the past 90 days.

Boeing delivered average positive earnings surprise of 28.01% in the last four quarters. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2018 earnings has moved up 3% to $15.05 in the past 90 days.

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