Related: The Biggest Gun Dealers on Planet Earth
War is the bu$ine$$, and bu$ine$$ is good!
"Raytheon reaches deal worth reported $7 billion with Poland" by Hiawatha Bray Globe Staff April 21, 2015
Even as the United States cuts its military spending, insurgencies in Eastern Europe and civil wars in the Middle East are raging. It is a disaster for world peace but an opportunity for US arms makers such as Waltham-based Raytheon Co.
And you see up top who there business agents are -- the same guys spouting and selling peace.
Related:
"House and Senate GOP negotiators neared agreement Monday on a budget blueprint delivering an almost $40 billion budget boost to the Pentagon."
That's some cut.
In the past six months, Raytheon has made three overseas sales of its Patriot missile defense systems. The company’s latest win was revealed Tuesday, when the government of Poland chose the Patriot over a host of American and European rivals.
The Polish paper Gazeta Wyborcza, which first reported the deal, estimated its value at $7 billion. But Raytheon spokesman Michael Doble said the exact terms of the sale, including price, are still being worked out.
“We’ve been selected, but the contract has not been written,” said Doble. “We don’t know the dollars . . . now we have to negotiate the terms and conditions of the contract.”
A statement issued by the Polish government on Tuesday said Poland plans to acquire eight Patriot batteries by 2025, including two to be deployed in the first three years of the deal. The Polish government will also require Raytheon to share its technical know-how with Polish companies, which will assist in building and maintaining the Patriot system.
According to Bloomberg News, the Patriot deal is part of Poland’s $38 billion effort to upgrade its military, in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its support of separatist rebels in Ukraine.
Well, they didn't annex it. The Crimeans voted to join, but at this point the distortions and lies coming from the Amerikan media are a goddamn given.
But Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., said that the Patriot system would offer little protection if the Russians were to move against Poland.
“I don’t believe that the Patriots are a smart or effective way to counter the Russians militarily,” said O’Hanlon. “The Russians have too many missiles.”
Who cares? It's a $ale that keeps the war machine humming, and who knows? They may need those missiles a lot sooner than you think from the blog rolls I've been reading -- as well as the propaganda pre$$ itself, which is doing its damnedest to promote and foment more wars.
Instead, O’Hanlon said the deal is really about strengthening Poland’s ties to the United States. “Politically, the Poles obviously want to lock in their alliance with us,” he said. “For them, there is a value in buying weaponry that the United States provides, that we also use in our own military.”
Indeed, the US Embassy in Poland issued a statement praising the selection of Patriot, calling it “an important moment in the security partnership between Poland and the United States.” Of course,
The embassy said Poland’s choice will simplify joint training exercises with other nations of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which also use the Patriot system.
With the winding down of military engagements in Afghanistan and, at least initially, in Iraq, and across-the-board budget cuts to rein in the federal deficit, overall US defense spending has declined by 20 percent since 2010, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Yeah, the winding down of Afghanistan(!!) while Iraq is being REWOUND!
But the institute said military spending is climbing in much of the world, driven by the Ukraine crisis and by terrorist violence and civil wars in the Middle East and Africa.
And WHO BENEFITS AGAIN?
“Missile defense systems are in big demand in the Middle East and Asia.” said Peter Arment, a defense industry analyst at the investment firm Sterne Agee in New York. “The fact that peace and prosperity’s not breaking out tends to keep their systems in high demand.”
Gee, makes you wonder who is really behind the "terrorists," huh?
The world’s top arms makers are vying for a share of the market. In Poland, Raytheon fended off bids from American rival Lockheed Martin, the French aerospace company Thales SA, and the European consortium MBDA, which includes airplane maker Airbus.
Of course, the governments of those countries are committed to peace, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah!
Raytheon has had considerable success in selling Patriot to foreign buyers. Last week, the company announced a $2 billion sale to an undisclosed foreign government.
Still don't know the unnamed buyer.
In March Raytheon got an $815 million contract to upgrade existing Patriot systems in South Korea. And last December Raytheon won a $2.4 billion deal to provide Patriots to Qatar, an Arab nation.
Thanks to contracts like these, Raytheon generated $8.4 billion in foreign sales last year. That is 29 percent of the company’s total revenues, a higher percentage than any other major US military contractor.
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And where else can money be made?
Raytheon targeting computer weaknesses with $1.9 billion cybersecurity deal; Digital threats push Websense purchase" y Hiawatha Bray Globe Staff April 20, 2015
With its $1.9 billion deal to acquire network security company Websense, Waltham-based defense contractor Raytheon Corp. hopes to prepare its customers for a world in which any electronic device or network connection could become the gateway for a devastating digital attack.
“Today’s enterprises are more vulnerable than ever due to the proliferation of cloud computing, mobile devices, and the Internet of things,” said David Wajsgras, president of Raytheon’s intelligence, information, and services business, during a conference call Monday on the Websense acquisition. “Our goal is to provide an integrated defense.”
Raytheon is famed for the Tomahawk, Patriot, and Sidewinder guided- missile systems and is a major maker of radar and electronic warfare gear. But over the past decade, Raytheon has done more than a dozen cybersecurity-related deals, including the $420 million acquisition in November of Blackbird Technologies, a surveillance and cybersecurity company.
Up to now, Raytheon’s security practice has mainly served the company’s traditional customers in the military and aerospace sectors, said Monolina Sen, a senior cybersecurity analyst for ABI Research in London.
The Websense acquisition, Sen said, “will help it to expand its reach in other sectors such as finance, retail, education, health care, and so on.”
How do you feel about military contractors and war-profiteers running business, school, and health software -- especially given the history of cost overruns and disappeared trillions??
Oh, that's right. I forgot that the elite and the agenda-pushing and promoting corporations that profit from war are taking good care us and wanting the peace we all yearn for.
Websense makes products that can analyze data flowing in and out of corporate networks, to identify a variety of threats, including malicious e-mails, corrupted Internet sites, and infected computers inside the company’s firewall.
All seems to trace back to Silicon Valley.
For instance, Websense can test an attached software file by running it inside a “sandbox” that isolates it from the rest of the company network. It has a constantly updated database of known malicious Internet addresses; access to these addresses can be blocked automatically.
And Websense makes tools that can prevent infected computers from transmitting sensitive company data.
Yeah, whose benefiting from all the hacking while the NSA and FBI can't find anyone?
Peter Firstbrook, a vice president at research firm Gartner Inc., said Raytheon is preparing for a new torrent of digital threats that will arise when our phones, cars, household appliances, factory gear, and nearly everything else will be connected through data networks.
The interlocking and $elf-$erving tyranny is striking as it descends upon us. But people love their gadgets and corporations insist their is nothing to worry about paying by app for everything. It's constantly promoted in my Globe.
In this “Internet of things,” people will be able to control and manage all these devices from anywhere in the world. But a security flaw in a single device could give criminals or spies easy access to sensitive data, or let them vandalize critical business or government computer systems.
Never you mind that NSA trapdoor installed with the software.
Firstbrook said that when billions of devices join the Internet of things, it will be extremely difficult to install security on one device at a time. So Raytheon will use its Websense purchase to develop systems that can scan entire networks for malicious activity. “If you’re protected in the network,” Firstbrook said, “you have a better chance of detecting this stuff.”
Raytheon will pay $1.3 billion in cash to acquire an 80 percent stake in Austin, Texas-based Websense from its current owner, the private-equity firm Vista Equity Partners LLC.
It's a wonderful $y$tem of tyranny we have.
In addition, Raytheon will lend $600 million to Websense and combine the company with Raytheon’s existing cybersecurity business, valued at $400 million.
The deal is expected to close in the second quarter of the year, and the resulting security company will be renamed at that time, according to a Raytheon spokesman. The deal will not affect Raytheon’s operations in Massachusetts, and no job losses or relocations are expected.
But....
John McCormack, Websense’s chief executive, will hold the same title for the newly created company.
Raytheon chief executive Thomas Kennedy said the new company will be managed independently, to ensure it is not overwhelmed by the bureaucratic style of a major defense contractor.
“It’s not going to get smothered under the mother Raytheon defense ship,” Kennedy said.
Raytheon and Websense face increasing competition from other cybersecurity firms. Firstbrook, the Gartner analyst, said Websense faces a tough fight against its biggest rival, Blue Coat Systems Inc., which was acquired last month by Bain Capital LLC of Boston for $2.4 billion. Firstbrook said that Blue Coat is popular with governments around the world, while Websense mainly serves small and medium-size companies.
Ah, Bain getting involved. $mells like $ucce$$ful altrui$m to me!
But in the face of major cybersecurity breaches, like the 2013 credit card theft at Target Corp. or last year’s breach at Sony Corp., Raytheon officials expect to ride a wave of strong demand for data security upgrades. Wajsgras said the global market for information security products and services stands at $70 billion and that sales will grow 8 percent per year through 2018.
Sorry I missed the Interview, but I looked into those, and who benefits?
Raytheon’s shares closed down 23 cents at $107.49 on the New York Stock Exchange.
Seemed to make $en$e at the time.
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Related:
"Raytheon Co. raised its 2015 profit forecast after reaching a contract settlement with the United Kingdom that boosted the bottom line at the world’s largest missile maker. The Waltham company got about $131 million after taxes in resolving a dispute over the cancellation of work on the UK’s eBorders passenger information program. During the quarter, Raytheon won a $769 million contract from South Korea to upgrade Patriot air and missile defense systems. Since December, it has won at least $5 billion of international Patriot orders, including a $2 billion deal with Saudi Arabia, and it is poised to seal a bid in Poland. “We have a very specific focus on international,” chief financial officer Toby O’Brien said Thursday. “Our solutions and capabilities are here to meet the threats that our international customers are seeing.”
