Pentagon Awards $1.2 Billion in Contracts Friday

Ending the week with a "bang," to coin a phrase, the U.S. Department of Defense announced nine contract awards Friday -- worth at least $1.2 billion in total value (and potentially, even more than that).

One single company won more than three-quarters of the funds on offer, however, when privately held Hoist Liftruck Manufacturing of Bedford Park, Ill. was awarded $925 million to supply "commercial-type material handling equipment" to the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA). As for the other winners, there were only two of real interest to stock investors:

The Bell-Boeing Joint Project Office -- a joint venture between Textron and Boeing that is primarily focused on manufacturing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft -- was awarded a $43 million firm-fixed-price, sole-source contract to supply prop rotor gearboxes to the DLA.

Meanwhile, McKesson Corporation won a $29.9 million option-exercise on an existing contract, hiring McKesson to do work on a digital imaging network-picture archive communication system -- also for the DLA. The option being exercised retains McKesson's services for two years beyond the underlying contract's (now completed) two-year base term. A second option, only one year in length, may or may not be exercised after this current two-year option runs out on Aug. 22, 2015.

The article Pentagon Awards $1.2 Billion in Contracts Friday originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Rich Smith has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends McKesson. The Motley Fool owns shares of Textron. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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