US military budgets are under pressure and BAE Systems (BAE) has already warned its sales could suffer, so imagine the defence contractor's relief when a $780m (£513m) contract from the Pentagon landed on its desk. It wants BAE to keep making IMX-101 explosives for the US Army for at least the next five years and has placed an initial order worth $18.4m.
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That BAE won the work is no surprise. It developed the so-called insensitive munition (IM) and has been running the Holston plant in Tennessee where it is made for 14 years. Americans like IMX-101 because it is far less likely to explode accidentally or through enemy fire than cheaper TNT-filled artillery.
