Northrop Grumman is an aerospace and defense technology company, and also the world’s largest shipbuilder.  It is involved in the design, manufacture and maintenance of defense systems across all environments, including underwater, on the ground, in the air, in outer space and online.  Most of the firm’s business is with the U.S. federal government, especially the Department of Defense, but it also contracts with state and local governments, foreign governments, and domestic and international commercial clients.  

The firm is the end result (or perhaps the still-in-progress result) of a number of corporate combinations.  The present incarnation was created by the 1994 merger of Northrop Corp. and Grumman Aerospace, both airplane manufacturers founded in the first half of the 20th century.  New tiles were added to the mosaic through both the 1990s and the 2000s, which saw the acquisitions of defense electronics maker Westinghouse Electronic Systems; defense IT contractor Logicon; unmanned systems builder Teledyne Ryan; IT, electronics and shipbuilder Litton Industries; shipbuilder Newport News Shipbuilding; and many other providers of defense and technology services.  An attempted multibillion-dollar merger in 1998 with Lockheed Martin, fellow aerospace and defense behemoth, was nixed by federal regulators over antitrust concerns.

Northrop Grumman’s IT consulting activities are carried out primarily through its information and services practice, which is divided into three segments: mission systems, information technology and technical services.  The mission systems segment focuses on complex systems integration for military command situations, intercontinental ballistic missile modernization, air defense, airborne reconnaissance, intelligence management and processing, and decision support systems.  The information technology arm, meanwhile, provides more general systems engineering and integration across a full lifecycle, as well as enterprise solutions and cybersecurity.  And through its technical services segment, the firm provides a range of support-based services, such as logistics, sustainment, and training and simulation.