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I used to work at Raytheon. The one weird thing about the defense business is how few businesses and they end up making strange alliances. We were parters wit

I used to work at Raytheon. The one weird thing about the defense business is how few businesses and they end up making strange alliances. We were parters with Boeing on the project I worked on, but bidding against them on other projects. Raytheon got rid of all its commercial ventures, Amana appliances, RayMarine, Beech aircraft and anything competing in the private sector was spun off. There corporate structure had a lot of legacy from previous mergers (before my joining) which seemed to be stuck at 85% complete. I can't see how this merger isn't going to set off anti-trust alarm bells in washington, but these companies are well connected.

hbosch 7y ago
Who in Washington will be taking up anti-trust discussions against the maker of Tomahawk missiles?
- barkingcat 7y ago
  The makers of Trident of course.
baybal2 7y ago
> I used to work at Raytheon. The one weird thing about the defense business is how few businesses and they end up making strange alliances. Semiconductor industry is heading this way too
griffinkelly 7y ago
All the defense companies keep merging. If you look back 30 years ago at the number and variety of airplanes the US military flew, you'd have a dozen or so companies, many now top of mind defunct or merged--Grumman, McDonnell Douglas, Fairchild. My dad used to work for Texas Instruments' defense wing, which merged into Raytheon, developed JSOW missiles. I'm by no means an expert in this, but I think its largely attributed to the contracts going to the lowest bidder, a struggle to compete for them, and move R&D forward simultaneously.
- TaylorAlexander 7y ago
  I wonder if it’s also a way to cover up shady practices. Shuffle the deck every once in a while so it’s hard to track the records if a political reckoning ever came.
- nradov 7y ago
  Systems have become tremendously more complex in the past 30 years. It's just no longer feasible for a medium sized company to act as a prime contractor due to lack of breadth and resources.
nostrademons 7y ago
Much of peacetime military procurement is all about keeping defense contractors alive "just in case" (which you could look at charitably as "maintaining readiness for the next war" or uncharitably as "corporate welfare and pork barrel politics"). Right now, we're at peace. There's no reason for these companies to exist - except that if they didn't, it might encourage adversaries who believe it would be an opportune time for war. A lot of things that don't really make sense on a military level make a lot more sense on a corporate welfare level. Each Virginia-class submarine is built half at Newport News in Virginia and half at Electric Boat in Connecticut; this is far more expensive than just building the subs in one yard, but is intended to keep both submarine manufacturers in business. The Ford class carriers and F-35 warplanes both contain numerous design innovations that don't really work in practice, but could be viewed as experimentation so that we have engineers with experience in various techniques should we ever need to rapidly build up the military later. The F-35 itself has a large number of subcontractors; you could look at that as a way to make sure that expertise in the program remains widely distributed across as many firms as possible. I suspect the government is content to allow mergers because it doesn't really reduce the deterrent value of having these programs exist, and the whole point of their existence is to funnel money to defense contractors. If we actually got into a major arms race you'd probably see an explosion of new defense contractors as people start chasing the money available, but for now we're at peace with a shrinking military.
- lbotos 7y ago
  I agree with you re: keeping them alive, but the US is very much perpetually at war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_lengths_of_United_States_participation_in_wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_lengths_of_United_... Almost so much so, that it seems like a reason to keep them alive.
  - rhino369 7y ago
    Those low-grade conflicts aren't what much of the US military is designed for--a large conflict with another capable military force like China, Russia, etc. They are occupations and anti-surgency operations. A major conflict would require a lot of new manufacturing.
rrhyne 7y ago
Palantir and Spacex are some of the few ‘startups’ to win government contracts and they had to sue the government to get them.
lil-scamp 7y ago
Satellite imaging is the same way, too. It's pretty hard to be an independent commercial satellite imaging company—most have been scooped up by MDA (Digital Globe) or PLanet Labs (Skybox, Rapideye) Wonder if Capella Space will break through.

hbosch 7y ago

Who in Washington will be taking up anti-trust discussions against the maker of Tomahawk missiles?

barkingcat 7y ago
The makers of Trident of course.

baybal2 7y ago

> I used to work at Raytheon. The one weird thing about the defense business is how few businesses and they end up making strange alliances. Semiconductor industry is heading this way too

griffinkelly 7y ago

All the defense companies keep merging. If you look back 30 years ago at the number and variety of airplanes the US military flew, you'd have a dozen or so companies, many now top of mind defunct or merged--Grumman, McDonnell Douglas, Fairchild. My dad used to work for Texas Instruments' defense wing, which merged into Raytheon, developed JSOW missiles. I'm by no means an expert in this, but I think its largely attributed to the contracts going to the lowest bidder, a struggle to compete for them, and move R&D forward simultaneously.

TaylorAlexander 7y ago
I wonder if it’s also a way to cover up shady practices. Shuffle the deck every once in a while so it’s hard to track the records if a political reckoning ever came.
nradov 7y ago
Systems have become tremendously more complex in the past 30 years. It's just no longer feasible for a medium sized company to act as a prime contractor due to lack of breadth and resources.

nostrademons 7y ago

Much of peacetime military procurement is all about keeping defense contractors alive "just in case" (which you could look at charitably as "maintaining readiness for the next war" or uncharitably as "corporate welfare and pork barrel politics"). Right now, we're at peace. There's no reason for these companies to exist - except that if they didn't, it might encourage adversaries who believe it would be an opportune time for war. A lot of things that don't really make sense on a military level make a lot more sense on a corporate welfare level. Each Virginia-class submarine is built half at Newport News in Virginia and half at Electric Boat in Connecticut; this is far more expensive than just building the subs in one yard, but is intended to keep both submarine manufacturers in business. The Ford class carriers and F-35 warplanes both contain numerous design innovations that don't really work in practice, but could be viewed as experimentation so that we have engineers with experience in various techniques should we ever need to rapidly build up the military later. The F-35 itself has a large number of subcontractors; you could look at that as a way to make sure that expertise in the program remains widely distributed across as many firms as possible. I suspect the government is content to allow mergers because it doesn't really reduce the deterrent value of having these programs exist, and the whole point of their existence is to funnel money to defense contractors. If we actually got into a major arms race you'd probably see an explosion of new defense contractors as people start chasing the money available, but for now we're at peace with a shrinking military.

lbotos 7y ago
I agree with you re: keeping them alive, but the US is very much perpetually at war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_lengths_of_United_States_participation_in_wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_lengths_of_United_... Almost so much so, that it seems like a reason to keep them alive.
- rhino369 7y ago
  Those low-grade conflicts aren't what much of the US military is designed for--a large conflict with another capable military force like China, Russia, etc. They are occupations and anti-surgency operations. A major conflict would require a lot of new manufacturing.

rrhyne 7y ago

Palantir and Spacex are some of the few ‘startups’ to win government contracts and they had to sue the government to get them.

lil-scamp 7y ago

Satellite imaging is the same way, too. It's pretty hard to be an independent commercial satellite imaging company—most have been scooped up by MDA (Digital Globe) or PLanet Labs (Skybox, Rapideye) Wonder if Capella Space will break through.