Global Opportunities. Global Partners.

In its globally inclusive approach to business, Lockheed Martin's goals are to establish and maintain enduring international alliances with government and advanced technology partners around the world, and be seen as their international partner of choice. Lockheed Martin offers three major attributes to its more than 300 partnerships in more than 30 countries -- advanced technology, financial strength and proven performance in matching corporate breadth and depth to customer priorities.

In Continental Europe and the United Kingdom, Lockheed Martin maintains long-term partnerships with such major advanced technology companies as AgustaWestland, Alcatel, Alenia, Arianespace, BAE SYSTEMS, Blohm + Voss, Diehl, EADS, Fokker/Stork, Hellenic Aerospace Industry, IABG, Izar (formerly Empresa Nacional Bazan), Marshall Aerospace, Rolls-Royce/Allison, SABCA, Siemens, Signaal, Smiths Aerospace, SONACA, Thales and Turkish Aircraft Industries. Add to that a lengthy list of Continental European and British suppliers and subcontractors with whom we do business regularly.

Among the major programmes Lockheed Martin is working on with its international partners are the Joint Strike Fighter, in which BAE SYSTEMS joins Northrop Grumman as a full partner on the F-35 JSF team, and the MEADS (Medium Extended Air Defense System) programme, with EADS and Alenia Difesa as full partners in the MEADS International joint venture. Both the JSF and the MEADS programmes serve the harmonized military requirements of NATO governments.

Lockheed Martin and the Spanish shipbuilder, Izar, joined initially to meet Spanish Navy requirements for a new frigate with advanced combat systems. The partnership then won a contract to meet similar requirements for the Norwegian Navy and is now pursuing other surface combatant opportunities around the world with their F-100 frigate design. In conjunction with AgustaWestland, Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor and systems integrator for the Royal Navy's Merlin helicopter programme.

The F-35, MEADS, F-100 and Merlin programmes, along with the F-16 and C-130J, are examples of Lockheed Martin pursuing global opportunities with global partners.

To further encourage strong international industry partnerships in the defense market, Lockheed Martin advocates that NATO member governments increasingly harmonize their future military requirements and establish a single common transatlantic defense market that is integrated, open and competitive, supported by a transatlantic defense industrial base that is innovative and robust.

Equal industry access throughout this combined transatlantic defense market would enable NATO to mobilize European and U.S. industry to work together to correct the "requirements-capabilities gap" that threatens the ability of NATO military forces to operate jointly with modern systems across the full spectrum of defense capabilities.

European and American industry would cooperate and compete on an equal footing, all in support of preserving and enhancing the military capabilities of the NATO alliance. In the near term, the emphasis would be on practical partnerships organized around specific projects or lines of business, rather than transatlantic mergers.

From defending the nation to a host of major civil government and select commercial projects such as air, rail and vessel traffic management, distribution technologies, information technology management, satellite systems and remote sensing, Lockheed Martin is focused on the evolving priorities of its customers. These are the priorities that Lockheed Martin and its global partners are helping governments and select commercial customers meet. Day after day. Year after year. For the long-term.