Boeing Relocating C‑130 AMP, B‑1 Program to Oklahoma City

LONG BEACH, Calif. — The Boe­ing Com­pa­ny [NYSE: BA] today announced it will relo­cate the C‑130 Avion­ics Mod­ern­iza­tion Pro­gram (AMP) and B‑1 Pro­gram from Long Beach to Okla­homa City. The move will begin with C‑130 AMP start­ing in the first quar­ter of 2011 and con­clude by the end of 2012 with the move of the B‑1 Pro­gram.

Both pro­grams are part of the Main­te­nance, Mod­i­fi­ca­tions & Upgrades (MM&U) divi­sion of the Glob­al Ser­vices & Sup­port (GS&S) busi­ness unit of Boe­ing Defense, Space & Secu­ri­ty. The pro­grams now employ approx­i­mate­ly 800 peo­ple in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia. About 550 posi­tions will be relo­cat­ed to Okla­homa City. The remain­ing posi­tions will be reduced from the pro­grams over the next two years as con­tracts are fulfilled. 

MM&U Vice Pres­i­dent and Gen­er­al Man­ag­er Mark Bass said relo­cat­ing the pro­grams will help Boe­ing pro­vide a more com­pet­i­tive cost struc­ture for customers. 

“Mak­ing a deci­sion like this is nev­er easy, but as we reviewed our antic­i­pat­ed oper­at­ing costs for the next sev­er­al years, it became clear that Boe­ing needs to take major actions on these pro­grams in order to remain afford­able for our cus­tomers,” Bass said. “We remain com­mit­ted to main­tain­ing the excel­lent record of per­for­mance that our employ­ees deliv­er for our U.S. Air Force B‑1 and C‑130 AMP cus­tomers dur­ing this transition.” 

Dur­ing the move, some employ­ees will be relo­cat­ed, while oth­er posi­tions will be post­ed and hired local­ly in Okla­homa City. Com­pa­ny man­agers are deter­min­ing which employ­ees will be offered relo­ca­tion to Okla­homa City. Boe­ing will pro­vide assis­tance for work­ers who do not make the tran­si­tion, includ­ing help in search­ing for oth­er poten­tial posi­tions with­in the company. 

“We will com­mu­ni­cate open­ly and often with our employ­ees through­out this process,” Bass said. 

C‑130 AMP brings com­mon­al­i­ty to the C‑130 fleet by offer­ing flex­i­bil­i­ty in assign­ing air­crew, regard­less of the mod­el design type, and reduc­ing air­craft oper­at­ing costs while address­ing obso­les­cence and pro­vid­ing for future capa­bil­i­ty growth. The pro­gram recent­ly was approved by the Air Force for low-rate ini­tial production. 

The Boe­ing B‑1 Pro­gram is mod­ern­iz­ing the B‑1 Lancer bomber to fur­ther enhance its con­ven­tion­al muni­tions capa­bil­i­ty. Mul­ti­ple upgrades are being test­ed this year to improve the bomber’s capabilities. 

A unit of The Boe­ing Com­pa­ny, Boe­ing Defense, Space & Secu­ri­ty is one of the world’s largest defense, space and secu­ri­ty busi­ness­es spe­cial­iz­ing in inno­v­a­tive and capa­bil­i­ties-dri­ven cus­tomer solu­tions, and the world’s largest and most ver­sa­tile man­u­fac­tur­er of mil­i­tary air­craft. Head­quar­tered in St. Louis, Boe­ing Defense, Space & Secu­ri­ty is a $34 bil­lion busi­ness with 68,000 employ­ees worldwide. 

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Contact: 

For­rest Gos­sett
Boe­ing Com­mu­ni­ca­tions
Mobile: 314–363-0650
forrest.s.gossett@boeing.com

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