[SatNews] ITT Corporation (NYSE:ITT) has now passed a key milestone with the successful completion of the Critical Design Review (CDR) for the Navigation Payload Element (NPE) the company is developing for the U.S. Air Force’s Global Positioning System (GPS) program, GPS III. ITT is a major teammate on the Lockheed Martin team that was selected in May 2008 by the U.S. Air Force to build the nexgen GPS III program.
ITT integrates and tests the components in the NPE on to the GPS III Space Vehicle flight panel for delivery to Lockheed Martin which is then assembled in to the Space Vehicle for testing. The NPE consists of several transmitter units and the mission data unit, both designed and built by ITT; Atomic Frequency Time Standard; passive RF components, and various harnesses and cables. The NPE generates and transmits all of the navigation signals for military and civil users and maintains the highly precise timing for navigation performance. The NPE CDR was conducted at ITT’s facilities in Clifton, N.J., on June 24, 2010, and represents the successful culmination of the CDRs of all 11 major components of the NPE. The CDR demonstrated that the NPE design meets all program requirements, and showed complete compliance with the rigorous GPS III mission assurance standards. Based on the thorough review of the hardware designs, the NPE is ready to proceed to the manufacturing phase of the program.
