spacetoday.net: Lockheed Martin reports strong earnings

Posted: Wed, Jul 26, 2006, 6:43 AM ET (1043 GMT)

Lockheed Martin's space unit reported Tuesday a significant increase in sales and profits in the last quarter. The Space Systems unit of the company announced an operating profit of $189 million on $2.1 billion in sales in the second quarter, compared to an operating profit of $146 million on sales of $1.63 billion in the same quarter of 2005. The company attributed the increased sales in part to a higher volume of government and commercial satellite programs, while launch sales were relatively unchanged. The increase in profit was credited to increased commercial satellite deliveries as well as improved performance on the Atlas launch vehicle program.