By Doug Cameron
Sikorsky Aircraft announced plans Friday to shed 600 workers in
response to weaker demand for its military helicopters following
defense budget cuts in the U.S. and overseas, though also secured a
new $3.5 billion deal with Turkey.
The maker of Black Hawk helicopters has cut around 2,000 jobs
over the past two years, reducing its present workforce to 16,500
worldwide as it worked to trim costs and adapt to lower Pentagon
spending while pursuing international sales.
Sikorsky, a unit of United Technologies Corp., is the Pentagon's
largest helicopter supplier by value. It is pursuing a contract to
supply new presidential helicopters and a proposed fleet of rescue
helicopters for the U.S. military, in partnership with Lockheed
Martin Corp..
Sales dipped 8% last year to $6.3 billion, and its parent last
month trimmed the outlook for Sikorsky's operating profits this
year, which are now expected to be flat.
The Black Hawk is a workhorse of all four branches of the U.S.
military, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan led to a surge in
helicopter spending at the end of the last decade that is now
abated.
Sikorsky and rival Boeing Co. have been left to pursue a limited
number of new projects that have yet to secure firm funding from
the Pentagon, while others such a proposed new Army helicopter
aren't expected to feature in the fiscal 2015 budget due to be
previewed by defense secretary Chuck Hagel in a speech on
Monday.
The Turkey deal, first announced in 2011, will see Sikorsky
co-produce an initial batch of 109 helicopters, most of them for
the country's military.
Write to Doug Cameron at doug.cameron@wsj.com
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