Rapid Fire May 31, 2012: Defining Unmanned Missions

• Northrop Grumman is pitching a fleet of 3 to 5 modified Global Hawks Block 30s to Canada. The call it “Polar Hawk”. It’s a good thing Microsoft is not in charge of their branding: “Global Hawk Cold Proof Starter Edition” doesn’t have the same ring to it.

• RAND came up with methodologies to determine the future role and missions of UAVs.

• IAI sales for Q1 2012 are up 5% from a year ago to $894M. Its backlog reached $9.7B. Exports and military sales represent 80% and 76% of total sales respectively.