Talk:General Dynamics/Archive 1

Redirect
Gd could also mean Gadolinium, (and as mentioned, GD Graphics Library). So is the redirect from GD really a good idea here? Fayefox 10:27, 25 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The redirect is no longer here, as GD now points to a disambiguation page. Removed the redirect notice. --KJRehberg 18:02, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:General Dynamics logo.PNG
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List of Organizations/Contracts?
Has anyone considered whether discussing or listing various GD-held contracts are? I am new to Wikipedia editing, but thought that htis might be helpful to people researching GD.Dc3tech 18:37, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Charles Goodman
The architect Charles Goodman who died in 1992 has been incorrectly linked to this page as being Charles Goodman a director of the company who is very much still alive. Could someone please remove the link? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.83.160.132 (talk • contribs)

Elco
Where is the Electric Launch Company? That article claims: At the end of the war the company merged with its sister company Electric Boat to form the nucleus of a new corporation General Dynamics. Here no word about it.--WerWil (talk) 11:40, 1 December 2008 (UTC).

SACO Defense
This is yet another of the companies that redirect to the General Dynamics article which has no information. Just saying that XXXXX company was acquired by General Dynamics in YEAR is essentially useless. N4aof (talk) 20:49, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

OTS & ATP Merger
I can't edit this page. Can somebody please update the page to reflect the merger Ordinance and Tactical System and Armament and Technical Products. Press release is here http://www.generaldynamics.com/news/press-releases/detail.cfm?customel_dataPageID_1811=18539 Ctempleton3 (talk) 02:04, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150403222443/http://www.gdrs.com/robotics/programs/program.asp?UniqueID=22 to http://www.gdrs.com/robotics/programs/program.asp?UniqueID=22
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081220135913/http://www.gdrs.com/robotics/programs/program.asp?UniqueID=27 to http://www.gdrs.com/robotics/programs/program.asp?UniqueID=27
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External links modified
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External links modified (January 2018)
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Submarines?
The article provided an interesting history of GD’s aerospace business.

There is also the history of its pre-World War I submarine business but not much mention of subsequent submarine work in the century since.

Should that be included in this article, too? Seems like an important part of the company’s story. —107.77.232.166 (talk) 22:58, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Updates to the General Dynamics article
Hi! I'm posting here on behalf of General Dynamics, a company I have declared my COI. The article is rated C class across the six Wikipedia projects, giving a lot of room for improvement. To start, I noticed some inaccuracies and omissions in the Infobox, Corporate governance, Financials, and See also sections. Below are the suggested improvements to each part of the article. You can also see a draft version of these changes in my Sandbox. Let me know if there are any questions!--Chefmikesf (talk) 20:33, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Hey Afus199620, I have a few updates to the Financials and other tables on this article. Would you be open to take a look at the proposed changes below?--Chefmikesf (talk) 20:33, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks Afus199620, Do you think you can also make Financials and Corporate governance their own sections after History?--Chefmikesf (talk) 21:22, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

1.

Reason and Request: The current Infobox is out of date and missing data about the company's products and services. My suggestion updates the products, services, financials, and subsidiaries subsections. The Infobox also needs a photo of the headquarters. When the photo is available on Wikimedia Commons, I will update the request.

Current Infobox content

Proposed Infobox content

2.

Reason and Request: Corporate governance should have its own section. Based on WP:Companies guidelines, I'm suggested Corporate governance has its own section following the History section. Second, I created a table with the name and role for each of the board members.

Current Corporate governance content

Current members of the board of directors of General Dynamics are: Catherine Reynolds, Nicholas Chabraja, James Crown, William Fricks, Paul Kaminski, John Keane, Lester Lyles, Phebe Novakovic, William A. Osborn, Laura J. Schumacher and Robert Walmsley.

Proposed Corporate governance content

General Dynamics current chief executive officer is Phebe N. Novakovic.

Current as of December 2020

3.

Reason and Request: Financials section should have its own section. Based on WP:Companies, I'm suggested the Financials section have its own section following the Corporate governance section. Second, the current Financials section contains extraneous content not relevant to the section. My thoughts are to fold some of the content into the History section, e.g., paragraphs two and four, then remove the extraneous content, e.g., paragraph three.

Current Financials content

General Dynamics has $30.9 billion in sales as of 2017 primarily military, but also civilian with its Gulfstream Aerospace unit and conventional shipbuilding and repair with its National Steel and Shipbuilding subsidiary.

In 2004, General Dynamics bid for the UK company Alvis plc, the leading British manufacturer of armored vehicles. In March the board of Alvis Vickers voted in favor of the £309m takeover. However at the last minute BAE Systems offered £355m for the company. This deal was finalized in June 2004.

The corporation's subsidiaries are donors to the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute.

10% of General Dynamic stock is owned by the Crown family, which includes Nancy Carrington Crown and Steven Crown. This is the family's largest single asset.

Proposed Financials content

For the fiscal year 2019, General Dynamics reported net income of US$3.484 billion, with an annual revenue of US$39.350 billion, an increase of 8.72% over the previous fiscal cycle. General Dynamics's shares traded at over $150 per share, and its market capitalization was valued at over US$43.27 billion in January 2021.

Current as of December 2020.

4.

Reason and Request: Please add relevant articles to the See also section.

Current See also content


 * Top 100 Contractors of the U.S. federal government
 * List of companies headquartered in Northern Virginia

Proposed See also content


 * Top 100 Contractors of the U.S. federal government
 * List of companies headquartered in Northern Virginia
 * List of military aircraft of the United States
 * List of United States defense contractors
 * List of current ships of the United States Navy
 * List of currently active United States military land vehicles
 * List of women CEOs of Fortune 500 companies
 * List of shipbuilders and shipyards

Updating the Lead Paragraph


 * Hey Afus199620, I drafted an updated Lead below. Would you be open to review and if you think it improves the article, publishing the new version of the Lead?--Chefmikesf (talk) 20:22, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

1.

Current Lead

General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American aerospace and defense corporation. As of 2019, it was the fifth-largest defense contractor in the United States, and the sixth-largest in the world, by sales. The company ranked No. 92 in the 2019 Fortune 500 list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue. It is headquartered in Reston, Fairfax County, Virginia.

Formed in 1954 with the merger of submarine manufacturer Electric Boat and aircraft manufacturer Canadair, it evolved through multiple mergers and divestitures and changed markedly in the post–Cold War era of defense consolidation. General Dynamics' former Fort Worth Division, which manufactured the F-16 Fighting Falcon, was sold to the Lockheed Corporation in 1993, but GD re-entered the airframe business in 1999 with its purchase of business jet manufacturer Gulfstream Aerospace.

10% of General Dynamic stock is owned by the Crown family, which includes Nancy Carrington Crown and Steven Crown. This is the family's largest single asset.

Proposed Lead

General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded, aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Fairfax County, Virginia. As of 2020, it was the third-largest defense contractor in the United States, and the third-largest in the world, by sales. The company is a Fortune 100 company, and was ranked No. 83 in 2020.

Formed in 1954 with the merger of submarine manufacturer Electric Boat and aircraft manufacturer Canadair, the corporation today is comprised of ten subsidiary companies with operations in 45 countries. The company’s products include Gulfstream business jets, Virginia- and Columbia-class nuclear-powered submarines, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, M1 Abrams tanks and Stryker armored fighting vehicles.

In 2020, General Dynamics had worldwide sales of $37.9 billion and a workforce of more than 100,000 full-time employees. The current chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) is Phebe Novakovic.

Hi Sturmvogel 66, I noticed you're part of WP:Aviation and like military topics. I'm currently working on the General Dynamics Wikipedia article, there is room for improvement on a few sections. I have a COI with General Dynamics, so I will not edit the article myself but will present conceptual improvements on the talk page. To start, I rewrote the lead paragraph to clarify what the company does. Here is my proposed version. Any thoughts on this? --Chefmikesf (talk) 19:14, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * You repeated the location of the company's HQ, but it looks fine other than that. I'm not very familiar with what's covered in the articles on defense companies, so I really can't tell what ought to be there that's missing.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:46, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Hi Sturmvogel 66, Thanks for the feedback. I removed the second location and made some updates. The code was different from the post for some reason. My intention for the edits is to simplify the lead in case others wanted to add to it. Would you be open to making the update?--Chefmikesf (talk) 20:04, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Sure, but I'd like to check out the articles on a couple of the other major US defense companies. What you have so far is the bare bones of the lede, but I don't know what else should be there. I find ledes the hardest part of an article to write as it's hard to strike a balance between summarizing things and providing too much detail.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:11, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a good approach. As I said, I'm open to additions to the Lead, the intention of this version is to clean it up, remove unnecessary content, and bring attention to this article that needs improvement. Best, Chefmikesf (talk) 23:04, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I've copied your lede over and cut the county from the location. I'd suggest reinstating the bit about the sale of the Fort Worth Division and would also suggest that you rework the bit about the ten companies to cover instead the four main business groups like shipbuilding, aerospace, etc. Go ahead and make those changes and I'll put the article on my watchlist to provide some oversight. Cite #3 needs to be wikified, by which I mean that it needs to be put into one of the various cite formats like cite news, cite web, etc. If you're not familiar with them let me know and I can give you some pointers. Once you're comfortable with doing that you can go ahead and do the same with any other cites that need to be properly formatted. Another thing you could do would be to provide a citation wherever a citation needed tag is located.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:30, 23 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Hi Sturmvogel 66, Your suggestions make sense. I'll move this conversation to the General Dynamics talk page, then I'll ping you again once I have these updates drafted. Best --Chefmikesf (talk) 22:53, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

2022 Updates for General Dynamics Wikipedia article
1.

Reason and Request:The current Lead paragraph is outdated. Please update key factual data points with proposed copy below.

Existing Lead Paragraph sentence

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 United States by total sales. The company is a Fortune 100 company, and was ranked No. 83 in 2020.

Formed in 1954 with the merger of submarine manufacturer Electric Boat and aircraft manufacturer Canadair, the corporation today consists of ten subsidiary companies with operations in 45 countries. The company's products include Gulfstream business jets, Virginia- and Columbia-class nuclear-powered submarines, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, M1 Abrams tanks and Stryker armored fighting vehicles.

In 2020, General Dynamics had worldwide sales of $37.9 billion and a workforce of more than 100,000 full-time employees. The current chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) is Phebe Novakovic.

Proposed Lead Paragraph sentence update

General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded, aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Virginia. As of 2021, it was the fifth-largest defense contractor in the world by arms sales, and 5th largest in the United States by total sales. The company is a Fortune 100 company, and was ranked No. 94 in 2022.

Formed in 1954 with the merger of submarine manufacturer Electric Boat and aircraft manufacturer Canadair, the corporation today consists of ten subsidiary companies with operations in 45 countries. The company's products include Gulfstream business jets, Virginia- and Columbia-class nuclear-powered submarines, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, M1 Abrams tanks and Stryker armored fighting vehicles.

In 2020, General Dynamics had worldwide sales of $38.5 billion and a workforce of more than 103,000 full-time employees. The current chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) is Phebe Novakovic.

2.

Reason and Request: The current Timeline section mixes acquisitions, historical events, and executive leadership changes. The proposed content cleans up the content and turns it into a comprehensive acquisition and divestiture section. Please replace the current section with the proposed section.

Existing Timeline content

Timeline Electric Boat was established in 1899.

20th-century acquisitions


 * 1946 – Canadair purchased from the Canadian government.
 * 1952 – Electric Boat became General Dynamics.
 * 1953 – Convair merged with General Dynamics.
 * 1955 – Acquired Stromberg-Carlson.
 * 1957 - Purchased Liquid Carbonic Corporation of Chicago, Illinois, on September 30.
 * 1959 – Henry Crown acquires company and becomes majority shareholder.
 * 1962–1963 – Convair-produced Mercury-Atlas rockets launch four manned Mercury missions into low Earth orbit, including John Glenn.
 * 1971–1985 David S. Lewis, Jr., was chairman and chief executive officer. During his tenure, General Dynamics' revenues and earnings quadrupled.
 * 1982 – Formed General Dynamics Land Systems after the acquisition of Chrysler's combat systems.
 * 1995 – Acquired Bath Iron Works from Prudential Insurance.
 * 1996 – Acquired Teledyne Vehicle Systems.
 * 1997 – Acquired Lockheed Martin Defense Systems and Lockheed Martin Armament Systems.
 * 1997 – Acquired Advanced Technology Systems, formerly an operating unit of Lucent Technologies.
 * 1997 – Acquired Computing Devices International, formerly a division of Ceridian Corporation.
 * 1998 – Acquired National Steel and Shipbuilding Company.
 * 1999 – Acquired Gulfstream Aerospace from Forstmann Little.
 * 1999 – Acquired GTE Government Systems, Communication Systems, Electronic Systems and Worldwide Telecommunication Systems Divisions.
 * 2000 – Acquired Saco Defense from New Colt Holding Corp. which owned it since 1998.

21st-century acquisitions


 * 2001 – Acquired PrimeX Technologies Inc.
 * 2001 – Acquired Galaxy Aerospace Company from Israeli Aircraft Industries (IAI).
 * 2001 – Acquired Spain's Santa Bárbara Sistemas, one of the world's oldest arms manufacturers.
 * 2002 – Acquired German company EWK Eisenwerke Kaiserslautern, and changed its name to General Dynamics European Land Systems-Germany.
 * 2003 – Acquired GM Defense from General Motors.
 * 2003 – Acquired the Austrian heavy vehicle company Steyr-Daimler-Puch Spezialfahrzeug (SSF) from an Austrian investor group and formed the basis of General Dynamics European Land Systems (GDELS).
 * 2003 – Acquired Veridian and Digital Systems Resources.
 * 2003 – Acquired Datron's Intercontinental Manufacturing Company (IMCO) Unit.
 * 2004 – Acquired Spectrum Astro.
 * 2005 – Acquired MAYA Viz Ltd, the primary developer of the US Army's Command Post of the Future software into General Dynamics C4 Systems.
 * 2005 – Acquired Tadpole Computer.
 * 2005 – Acquired Itronix.
 * 2006 – Acquired FC Business Systems.
 * 2006 – Acquired Anteon International.
 * 2007 – Acquired Mediaware International.
 * 2008 – Acquired ViPS, Inc.
 * 2008 – Acquired Jet Aviation.
 * 2009 – Acquired Axletech International.
 * 2010 – Acquired Kylmar Ltd.
 * 2011 – Acquired Vangent, Inc. from The Veritas Capital Fund III, LP.
 * 2011 – Acquired Metro Machine Imperial Docks Inc.
 * 2011 – Acquired Force Protection Inc.
 * 2012 – Acquired Open Kernel Labs.
 * 2012 – Acquired Applied Physical Sciences.
 * 2016 - Acquired Bluefin Robotics into General Dynamics Mission Systems.
 * 2018 – Acquired CSRA Inc. for about $6.8 billion.

Divestitures


 * 1967 – General Atomics was sold to Gulf Oil.
 * 1969 - Forced by Federal order to divest itself of Liquid Carbonic Corporation in January; Liquid Carbonic was then purchased by Houston Natural Gas Co.
 * 1976 – Canadair sold back to the Canadian government.
 * 1981 – Following expropriation legislation passed by the government of the Province of Quebec, General Dynamics' Canadian subsidiary sold its 54.6% controlling interest in Asbestos Corporation Limited to the Quebec government-owned corporation, Société nationale de l'amiante (SNA).
 * 1991 – Data Systems Division sold to Computer Sciences Corporation.
 * 1992 – Tactical Missiles Division to Hughes Aircraft Company
 * 1992 – Cessna was sold to Textron.
 * 1992 – Electronics Division sold to Carlyle Group of Washington, D.C. and renamed GDE Systems.
 * 1993 – Fort Worth Division, a producer of fixed-wing military aircraft, was sold to Lockheed Corporation.
 * 1993 – Space Systems Division was sold to Martin Marietta.
 * 1994 – Convair's aerostructures unit's manufacturing work in San Diego was transferred to McDonnell Douglas.
 * 2006 – Material Service to Hanson.
 * 2007 – Freeman United Coal Mining Co. sold to Springfield Coal Co. for an undisclosed amount.
 * 2010 – Spacecraft development and manufacturing (a business group within the Advanced Information Systems division) to Orbital Sciences Corporation.
 * 2014 – Advanced Systems (another business line within Advanced Information Systems) to MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates

Proposed Acquisitions timeline content