While traveling in Silicon Valley, I noticed the old Lockheed Martin sign. It stood next to Amazon, Microsoft, HP among other technology unicorns.
By Managing Editor Intelligence Technology;
Michael Fayerman
Lockheed makes a number of sophisticated military components for our military. As our President elect outlined two most important vision statements “making America great again” and “bring jobs home”.
Lockheed and few other defense companies should be examined as part of reengineering (sorry for this dinosaur term) but I could not find a better statement to make my point. Lockheed is not only the PM and integrator but also is a state of the art manufacturing facility and product development shop. On the other hand, Apple deviously 😉 places logo “Design in America” on its products. Even Lockheed does not produce all the components in America. Also, Tech Pundits claim that if fully produced in US, the cost to consumer will double if not more. But is it really so?
Their neighbors in the Valley start picking up the trend. But we are far way from 50 to 100 percent end to end manufacturing path. To preserve our technical and military edge over adversary we need to produce foundation components here in the US. The end to end production would be picked up by not just military conglomerates but also civilian tech based manufacturing. For example, many components of military technology migrated to Safe City processes.
The Lockheed manufacturing evolved since the creation of 100 foot arrays for their “Space Station”. The place looks like a start-up: 3-d printers and automated welding machines. The paradox is the total cost of the manufacturing is 10 percent of the overall cost.
China significantly raised their manufactory pricing plus they are not our geopolitical friend. Also, it is more profitable to support multiple verticals both in military and civilian. The early adapters of US based manufacturing as part of company Eco-system will build with reduced manufacturing cost and create more jobs. The message should be its “cool” to make it in US!