Lockheed Martin (LMT) recently joined forces with privately owned Black & Veatch to garner a better slice of utilities modernizing in response to the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Smart Grid Investment Grant Program.
This $4.5 billion program is part of the DOE’s Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability Recovery Plan to support modernization of the electrical grid. The Lockheed – Black & Veatch partnership is well placed to cater to other DOE funding applications, such as loan guarantees for employing innovative energy efficiency, renewable energy and advanced transmission and distribution.
Together, the companies complement each other in assisting utilities plan projects and in requesting federal grants from the DOE. Lockheed Martin will provide its expertise in information management, business process reengineering, cyber security expertise, modeling and simulation and demand-response tools. Black & Veatch, a premier US contractor, will chip in with design and construction of telecommunications as well as transmission and distribution infrastructure.
Lockheed Martin is strategically spreading its wings outside the traditional defense-focused arena. The company recently saw a number of its high-value platform programs coming under the axe of the Obama administration, with the F-22 program being most noteworthy. Considering these, we maintain our Neutral recommendation on LMT.
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