Lockheed Martin

Three years after the Lockheed Martin plant in suburban Syracuse was nearly closed, the Salina location has received the single largest contract in its history. Changing methods of warfare have paved the way for more production of a special kind of radar made in central New York.

The central New York operation of Lockheed Martin failed to secure the third round of a lucrative Navy supply contract.

The first two rounds of funding for a new electronic warfare system known by the acronym SEWIP were given to Lockheed Martin’s plant in suburban Syracuse in 2013 and 2014. Last summers award was worth $147 million.

But the Navy decided to the award the third, and largest, part of the contract to competitor Northrup Grumman. The Navy says the contract is worth skywards of $300 million with all the options.

Another 80 employees at Lockheed Martin's factory in suburban Syracuse, N.Y. and 65 in Owego, N.Y. have been told they're out of a job in the second round of the layoffs to hit the sites this year.

The plan to reduce the workforce in the defense contractor's Mission Systems and Training unit was announced on Oct. 16. In all, 587 workers lost their job in the unit nationwide.

Lockheed Martin's radar and sensor facility just outside of Syracuse is safe for at least a year, but the company was close to closing it and relocating jobs, according to a news report.

The Post-Standard this morning cited unnamed sources and an internal document saying the defense contractor was in serious talks to shutter the facility in Salina and move the jobs there to other locations.

Workers at Lockheed Martin sites in central New York and the Southern Tier are being hit with another round of layoffs, but the company says the move is not tied to the government shutdown that just ended.

A total of 600 workers across the country will be out of a job early next month, according to the defense contractor.

Defense contractor Lockheed Martin has laid 114 workers at its site in suburban Syracuse and 25 in Owego, as part of the approximately 300 job cuts announced last month.

The 139 employees will be out of a job on August 15.

The reductions are in Lockheed's Mission Systems and Training division. The Salina and Owego plants work primarily in radar and sensor technology. The affected positions are mostly in engineering and program management.

Money for a defense contract that supports several hundred jobs at a plant in central New York has found its way back into a federal spending plan.

Money for the final year of a missile system that supports a few hundred jobs for a defense contractor near Syracuse has been removed from Congress' defense budget. But Lockheed Martin is keeping optimistic that the money could find its way back into the budget.