Jim McNerney on commercial and defense plans and programs.

Russia has claimed the successful test of a prototype of new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). The new missile was fired from a mobile launcher at the Plesetsk spaceport in May and its warhead reached a designated area in the Kura test range on the Kamchatka Peninsula. The military also said the missile will have improved capabilities to overcome anti-ballistic missile defenses being deployed by the U.S.—an important new priority for Moscow after years of trying to forestall U.S. missile-defense developments.

Walter J. Zable, the aerospace industry's oldest and longest-serving CEO and a pioneer in the field of global positioning, died June 23 of natural causes at a San Diego-area hospital. He was 97. Zable founded Cubic Corp. in 1951 in a San Diego storefront. Long before GPS was invented, the company developed a satellite-based technology that identified the location of land masses and enabled the U.S. military to pinpoint targets to improve the accuracy of ballistic missiles. Later, Cubic fielded the world's first instrumented air combat training system.

New flight trials for X-51, X-48, Phantom Eye demonstrate advanced vehicles

Lockheed VP says one way Orion could take astronauts to Mars

Sierra Nevada Advances Commercial Spaceplane...............

Astrium Services started in 2003 in the wake of a U.K. Defense Ministry decision to outsource secure satellite telecommunications to the private sector. Since then, CEO Eric Beranger has turned the division of European aerospace giant EADS into a high-stakes bet on government outsourcing for key space activities, taking privatization of satellite communications and remote-sensing services further than any other company in the industry and in some cases assuming big risks with little or no government backing.

An article that appeared in the June 25 issue of AW&ST (p. 36) included an incorrect spelling of the name of Intelsat Chief Technical Officer Thierry Guillemin.