Tracor was a major

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

n defense electronics contractor which was acquired by Marconi Electronic Systems (MES), a subsidiary of

General Electric Company plc The General Electric Company (GEC) was a major British industrial conglomerate involved in consumer and defence electronics, communications, and engineering. The company was founded in 1886, was Britain's largest private employer with over 25 ...

, in 1998. Following the purchase of MES by British Aerospace in November 1999 to form

BAE Systems BAE Systems plc (BAE) is a British multinational arms, security, and aerospace company based in London, England. It is the largest defence contractor in Europe, and ranked the seventh-largest in the world based on applicable 2021 revenue ...

, Tracor became BAE Systems Integrated Defense Solutions. Following a 2005 reorganisation, the company became BAE Systems Sensor Integration, part of Electronics and Integrated Solutions.

History

Tracor was founded in 1954 as Associated Consultants and Engineers. Tracor was the brainchild of physicist Richard N. Lane, its first president. He recruited Frank W. McBee, Dr. Chester McKinney, and Jess Stanbrough as its founders, and these four added an attorney friend, Harry Pollard, and machinist Byron Grisham, Jr. Early contracts included sales to

Union Carbide Union Carbide Corporation is an American chemical corporation wholly owned subsidiary (since February 6, 2001) by Dow Chemical Company. Union Carbide produces chemicals and polymers that undergo one or more further conversions by customers befo ...

and the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

. The company's early focus on research and development soon expanded to the manufacture of instruments and components. In 1960 the company was renamed Texas Research Associates and in 1962 merged with Textran Corporation (formed by physicist O. J. Baltzer, mechanical engineer Marcel Gres, mathematician Gene Smith, and accountant George Strandtmann) to become Tracor. Dr. D. Van Holliday was one of Tracor's founding employees In 1976, Tracor became the first Austin, Texas, based company on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1981, Tracor created Rokar International in Jerusalem, Israel for the development of advanced electronics for military and commercial applications. Tracor was acquired by Westmark Systems in 1986. Westmark was soon in financial difficulties partly because the $866 million deal was highly leveraged but also due to a collapse in oil prices. Westmark filed for bankruptcy protection in 1989 and in 1991 Tracor was split from the company. In 1993, Tracor increased its size dramatically with the acquisition of

Vitro Corporation Vitro Corporation was a major United States defense contractor which became part of BAE Systems Inc. in 1999. History Vitro was incorporated in 1950 as the Vitro Manufacturing Company. Its main product was slide transparencies for overhead proje ...

from

Penn Central Transportation Company The Penn Central Transportation Company, commonly abbreviated to Penn Central, was an American class I railroad that operated from 1968 to 1976. Penn Central combined three traditional corporate rivals (the Pennsylvania, New York Central and th ...

for $94 million. In 1994, Tracor purchased GDE Systems Inc. from the

Carlyle Group The Carlyle Group is a multinational private equity, alternative asset management and financial services corporation based in the United States with $376 billion of assets under management. It specializes in private equity, real assets, and ...

. (GDE Systems was originally the

General Dynamics General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded, aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Virginia. As of 2020, it was the fifth-largest defense contractor in the world by arms sales, and 5th largest in the Uni ...

Electronics Division before it was spun off.) In February 1996, Tracor acquired AEL Industries, an electronic warfare systems and components manufacturer which became part of the Tracor Aerospace division in March 1997. Tracor had a 30-year history of support of the

Aegis The aegis ( ; grc, αἰγίς ''aigís''), as stated in the ''Iliad'', is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a shield and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. There may be a connection with a d ...

defense system on United States Navy cruisers and destroyers. Tracor had great success in its later years designing and producing flare and chaff cartridges and their dispenser systems for military aircraft in defense against infrared- and radar-targeting missiles.

GEC takeover

announced its intention to acquire Tracor in April 1998 and to merge it with a North American subsidiary. Following a review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (

CFIUS The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS, commonly pronounced "Cifius" ) is an inter-agency committee of the United States government that reviews the national security implications of foreign investments in U.S. companie ...

) (to ensure there were no national security implications) GEC completed the transaction in June 1998. The relatively quick decision, particularly for such an important defense contractor, was due to the relationship which already existed between GEC and the Defense Department. A condition of the purchase was that GEC must appoint a " proxy board". This is a mechanism where the company is run locally by American managers and was employed in this case due to the many sensitive projects which Tracor was involved in. The

was a British company, not affiliated with the similarly named company which is based in the United States. It has since been renamed to Marconi plc. The acquisition was as a major expansion of GEC's defence division, GEC-Marconi (later Marconi Electronic Systems), however seven months later GEC announced the demerger of Marconi Electronic Systems (including the North American defence businesses) which would then merge with British Aerospace (BAe) to form BAE Systems. This process was completed on November 30, 1999. Commentators have described Tracor as the jewel in crown of GEC-Marconi North America.

BAE Systems

In the new company GEC's North American defense businesses were merged with BAe's U.S. interests to form BAE Systems North America. In the years since, BAE Systems has pursued growth in America more aggressively than any other area in order to take advantage of the large U.S. procurement and research budgets. Today BAE Systems Inc. (of which Tracor is a large part) is the largest foreign player in the U.S. defense market.

Organization

*Tracor Information Systems *Tracor Aerospace *Tracor Systems Technologies *Tracor Instruments *Tracor Applied Sciences

References

*Handbook of Texas Online "TRACOR," https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/dnt03 (accessed February 24, 2006) {{General Electric Company plc BAE Systems subsidiaries and divisions General Electric Company American companies established in 1954