Pentagon To Keep Flying FedEx, UPS, and American Airlines -- for $114 Million

The Department of Defense announced eight separate defense contracts Tuesday, worth $254.5 million in total. In terms of number of contract wins, Northrop Grumman NOC was the day's big winner with three awards, albeit the dollar values were small:
$37.1 million to continue logistics work on unspecified unmanned aerial vehicles for the U.S. Army through.
$12.3 million more to perform research on the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Supply Chain Hardware Integrity for Electronics Defense (SHIELD) program. DoD explained that SHIELD "aims to develop an advanced supply chain hardware authentication system and a capability that can detect counterfeit electronic components anywhere in the supply chain." This contract will run through July 2016.
And an $8.9 million delivery order to perform repairs on U.S. Navy E-2D Advanced Hawkeye test aircraft by December 2015.
L-3 Communications LLL took home one single award -- $8.5 million to accelerate deliveries and test support activities related to M-Code capable GPS receivers for the U.S. Army. This contract should be complete by Sept. 30, 2016.
Finally, the biggest award by dollar value was a U.S. Transportation Command (TRANSCOM) option exercise, instructing 10 companies to continue providing commercial air cargo transportation services to the Pentagon through Jan. 31, 2016. This award raises the value of the underlying contract by $114 million, to $281.6 million total. 10 companies will share in the award, including publicly-traded:

• Alaska Air ALK
• Atlas Air AAWW
• FedEx FDX
• UPS UPS
• and American Airlines AAL