There is plenty of good news in this report for the 5,000 builders of the Boeing C-17 in Long Beach. We also have good news about Amonix and MagTek, Inc., both of Seal Beach. In this biweekly series, we present updates on businesses of interest to West Orange County people.

The Boeing Company (NYSE: BA)
With major operations in Seal Beach, Long Beach, El Segundo, Huntington Beach, and Anaheim, The Boeing Company is probably the largest employer in the area. As such, there is almost always something newsworthy happening at Boeing.

Boeing employs about 5,000 people to build and support the C-17 Heavy airlifter at its plant in Long Beach. The program, and the attached jobs, has been under threat of cancellation since Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced last April the Defense Department did not need any more of the big 4 engine jets.

The Obama Administration’s defense budget submitted to congress last year did not provide for continuing production of the planes, but the House and Senate decided differently and order 10 more of the C-17s. Eventually, President Obama signed the defense budget into law, but since Boeing builds about 15 planes per year, the 10 more in the budget represented only a temporary reprieve.

Boeing has been trying to market the plane internationally to keep the profits flowing, the production line running, and the workers employed. This is where the good news comes in. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) Air Force and Air Defense announced Jan. 6 that the UAE has signed a contract for the acquisition of six Boeing C-17s. But, the good news doesn’t stop there.

Boeing recently announced the long awaited formal process for selling 10 planes to India took a significant step forward. “The U.S. government has received a Letter of Request from India's Ministry of Defense (MOD) and the Indian Air Force regarding the potential acquisition of 10 C-17 Globemaster III advanced airlifters.”

The C-17 conducted demonstration flights in February at Aero India 2009 in Bangalore, where members of the MOD and Indian Air Force had the opportunity to see the aircraft's capabilities in action. The Indian Air Force wants to replace and augment its fleet of Russian-made AN-32 and IL-76 airlifters.

"Nations looking to modernize their airlift capabilities turn to the C-17 because it has the highest reliability and mission-capable rate of any airlift aircraft," said Tommy Dunehew, Boeing Global Mobility Systems vice president of Business Development. "It is available right now, without any development risk. Plus, the C-17 is an acquisition success story, with deliveries on or ahead of schedule for the past decade."

A tactical and strategic airlifter, only the C-17 can carry large combat equipment and troops or humanitarian aid across international distances and deliver them directly to small austere airfields anywhere in the world. It can land combat-ready troops on semi-prepared runways or airdrop them directly into the fight. The C-17's ability to back up allows it to operate on narrow taxiways and congested ramps. With a payload of up to 170,000 pounds, the C-17 can take off and land in 3,000 feet or less.

There are currently 212 C-17s in service worldwide, including 19 with international customers. The U.S. Air Force, including active Guard and Reserve units, has 193. Other customers include the United Kingdom (which recently announced a contract for a seventh airlifter), Qatar, the Canadian Forces, the Royal Australian Air Force, and the 12-member Strategic Airlift Capability initiative of NATO and Partnership for Peace nations.

MagTek, Inc. (www.magtek.com)
This Seal Beach based company is “a global leader in secure electronic payment technology”, which means if you have swiped a card at the store, or gas station, or bank, you probably have used their equipment.

The company recently announced “Merchant Warehouse, a premier provider of merchant accounts and credit card processing solutions, has announced its enthusiastic support for dynamic card authentication using MagneSafe™, a digital identification and authentication architecture that safeguards consumers and their personal data.”

A key feature of MagneSafe is MagnePrint card authentication, a proven technology which reliably identifies counterfeit credit cards, debit cards, gift cards, ATM cards and ID cards at the point of swipe, before fraud occurs.

Tom Patterson, MagTek’s chief security officer says, “Our goal is to significantly reduce the merchants’ counterfeit card fraud losses by allowing their point of sale devices to simply decline any presented card that is not original. Banks win with lower fraud, merchants win with lower chargebacks, and consumers win by knowing that their stolen identities won’t be accepted for payment anymore.”

The technology behind MagnePrint has been developed and refined to fit within an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) bonded directly to the magnetic read head. MagnePrint secured devices include card readers (also known as Secure Card Reader Authenticators or SCRAs), card issuing equipment, encrypting PIN pads, and check readers & scanners.

"Meeting the requirements of PCI is a must. Effective data encryption is but one of many layers of necessary security and offers peace of mind for our customers. However, we also know it is just as important to give our customers the tools they need to decline fraudulent transactions where skimmed cards are presented and therefore limit their risk for chargebacks and costly fees", said Henry Helgeson, co-CEO of Merchant Warehouse. “We see dynamic card authentication as the lowest cost and most secure card processing service for our merchants.”

Amonix (www.amonix.com)
Also based in Seal Beach, is Amonix, which “designs and manufactures concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) solar power systems that require less water, use land better, and produce more energy per acre than any other solar technology.“
The company recently announced it will add some 436 jobs as a result of federal stimulus money, but the jobs are not at the Seal Beach headquarters.

The company said it “will create a total of 436 clean energy manufacturing jobs in Nevada and Arizona based on its award of $9.5 million in stimulus funding as part of the federal Recovery Act’s Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit. The company was granted $5.9 million for manufacturing work in Nevada, and $3.6
million for work in Arizona.

The company will begin construction of its new manufacturing facility in Nevada by the end of 2010. When completed in the first half of 2011, that facility will create 269 new jobs for the state. The Arizona facility, which will create 167 new jobs, is pegged for a 2011 construction start, with completion scheduled by the end of that year.

According to Brian Robertson, CEO of Amonix, “We’re pleased and honored to have received an allocation under the tax credit program, and we will move quickly to expedite the creation of these 436 green jobs for the new economy. This meaningful federal program will have a near-term positive impact upon the Nevada and Arizona economies.”

Amonix will use the funds to manufacture low-cost solar electricity systems using Fresnel lenses that concentrate sunlight. The systems generate solar electric power by concentrating light 500 times onto small, high efficiency solar cells.

This article is part of a regular biweekly survey of significant business and job developments of interest to West Orange County communities. This biweekly series appears every other Monday, alternating with our biweekly Orange County residential real estate Updates.