OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla., 30 June 2010. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is awarding contracts worth nearly $2 billion to Metron Aviation Inc. of Dulles, Va., and Booz Allen Hamilton Inc. of McLean, Va., for technology development and other engineering work related to the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) future air traffic management program.
The contracts are the last in a set of awards for engineering work that will upgrade the nation’s airspace and air traffic control systems to NextGen technology. The two contracts are the last of six awarded under System Engineering 2020 (SE-2020), which is in place to encourage small business participation. It has a ceiling of $6.5 billion, making it the largest set of awards in the agency’s history, FAA officials say.
The $1.15 billion contract awarded to Metron Aviation for 10 years is one of the largest ever awarded by the FAA to a small business. Metron will conduct large-scale demonstrations to see how NextGen concepts, procedures, and technologies can be integrated into the current air traffic management system, and will complement work done by Boeing, General Dynamics, and ITT under SE2020 contracts awarded last month, FAA officials say. The announcement was made at the FAA’s Small Business Conference at the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center in Oklahoma City, Okla.
The $711 million 10-year contract to Booz Allen Hamilton for 10 years follows the first SE2020 contract awarded to CSSI Inc., in April. Both companies will evaluate emerging procedures and technologies and perform systems engineering to determine the best way to deploy the NextGen initiatives on a wide scale. SE2020 is a contracting vehicle that streamlines NextGen funding across the FAA.
For more information contact Metron Aviation online at www.metronaviation.com, Booz Allen Hamilton at www.boozallen.com, or the FAA at www.faa.gov.
