General Atomics

General Atomics ( GA) is a U.S. high-tech companies with operations primarily in the areas of nuclear energy and military technology. The company's headquarters is located in San Diego. Currently ( 2008) the company has about 5,000 employees.

Offices are currently (2008) in Berlin, Dresden, Dusseldorf, Moscow, Tokyo, Adelaide, Washington DC, Denver, Los Alamos, Oklahoma City, Tupelo, Ogden.

History

The company was founded on 18 July 1955 as the nuclear energy division of General Dynamics. First president and founder of the foundation was Frederic de Hoffmann. In 1967 they were sold to Gulf Oil and renamed the "Gulf General Atomic ." 1973-1982 Shell was involved in the company that during this time, " General Atomic Company" was called. From 1982, they were called " GA Technologies Inc. " 1984 the parent company Gulf was acquired by Chevron. In 1986, the brothers took over Linden Blue ( b. 1936 ) and James Neal Blue ( * 1935) from Denver for 60 million U.S. dollars, the company renamed as General Atomics. Chairman and CEO of GA is James Neal Blue.

Since the company is privately owned, it does not need to publish sales figures and does not do so. A large part of sales but make out the Predator drone unmanned aerial vehicle ( UAV). In 2005, the Ministry of Defence announced that approximately $ 5.7 billion will be invested over five years in 144 Predator. In the same year, the Predator from the U.S. Air Force received use capability status (Initial Operating Capability ). James Neal Blue gave to the revenue share of the Predator drone in 2005, with around one-third.

Since the company is highly dependent on contracts of Defense, they invested heavily in lobbying in Washington, DC, 2006, she was criticized because it had a disproportionately large share of the travel sponsorship of U.S. Congressman ( by 2000, some by mid-2005 660,000 U.S. dollars, compared to about Boeing officially 13,000 U.S. dollars).

The company started with projects on nuclear energy and developed in the 1950s, the TRIGA nuclear reactor. At that time they were also responsible for the Project Orion. From 2007 to develop helium-cooled nuclear reactors (gas turbine modular helium reactor, GT- MHR ). They also operate one of the largest nuclear fusion energy programs in the nuclear industry ( research on tokamaks since the 1960s, in the 2000s in the DIII- D National Fusion Facility) and deal with the handling of radioactive waste.

Products

Your division General Atomics Aeronautical Systems manufactures the drone "Predator". You will also develop the electromagnetic aircraft carrier catapult EMALS (Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System). Next, they develop magnetic levitation ( Maglevs, Magnetically levitated systems and linear drives ), radar systems (Lynx Synthetic Aperture Radar) and mining engineering, eg for electric motors for dump trucks in the mining industry.

Organizational structure

  • Advanced Technologies Group Advanced Process Systems Division
  • Electromagnetic Systems Division
  • Systems Engineering Division
  • Nuclear Waste Management
  • Energy Group Controlled Fusion
  • Power Reactors
  • Photonics
  • Nuclear Fuels Group

Related companies:

  • General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA -ASI ) Aircraft Systems Group
  • Reconnaissance Systems Group
  • GBM Gleisbaumechanik Brandenburg
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