Program Decision Makers: Defense Firms Providing Less Value

Defense top contractors compared Defense Industry Daily surveyed more than 400 executives, asking them their opinions on the top defense contractors based both on their personal experiences and general impressions. The results show that defense contractors on average suffered worse ratings than were seen a year earlier. Some groups bore the brunt of that fall, particularly the information technology players. The lowered satisfaction ratings among the IT players corresponds to generally poor performance among the IT divisions of major contractors, as evidenced by July financial filings of General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin, as covered previously by DID. The bubble chart in the graphic shows the relative impressions of the different types of defense contractors, with those meeting schedules being the highest, those meeting quality standards extending to the right the furthest, and those meeting budgets showing the smaller bubbles. A link to the free executive summary can be found here. Defense executives generally felt strongly that a few major U.S. prime contractors hold a captured advantage against other firms in competition, often attributed either to a reluctance of military procurement managers to buy items from lower-tier firms or a more cynical read of a “revolving door” effect, with recent military […]