At age 47, Taylor W. Lawrence's career has followed a trajectory as dramatic as many of the missiles produced at Raytheon Missile Systems, where he's been president since July 2008.Lawrence attended the U.S. Naval Academy, switched to California Institute of Technology, then completed a master's and doctorate in applied physics at Stanford. He's done laser research and worked for the Pentagon, the U.S. Senate and Raytheon competitor Northrop Grumman.
The Missile Systems division of Raytheon Company employs about 11,500 people in the Old Pueblo. It also has operations in California, New Mexico, Kentucky, Arkansas and Alabama. With sales of $5.7 billion last year, Raytheon is the world's leading producer of weapon systems for the U.S. military and more than 50 allied countries.
Raytheon's broad portfolio of weapon systems supports every defense mission of its customers, including air-to-air, land combat, naval weapons, strike weapons, missile defense, guided projectiles and directed-energy systems.
Raytheon Company is a technology and innovation leader specializing in defense, homeland security and other government markets throughout the world. The corporation, which employs 72,000 people, is headquartered in Waltham, Mass.
Prior to being named president of Raytheon Missile Systems, Lawrence served as Raytheon's vice president of engineering, technology and mission assurance. In that role he guided the company's vision and provided corporate leadership in the strategic areas of technology and research, engineering, operations, performance excellence and mission assurance, which includes about 45,000 people working on more than 8,000 programs.
Before joining Raytheon, Lawrence held several vice presidential positions at Northrop Grumman. He previously served in a pair of high-level defense and government posts. He was deputy director of the Information Systems Office of the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, then was selected by U.S.
Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., as staff director for the Select Committee on Intelligence for the U.S. Senate.
Freelance journalist David B. Pittman met up with the Raytheon executive at Lawrence's office overlooking runways at Tucson International Airport.
Q. At 47 years old, aren't you a little young to be running the world's largest missile maker?
A. Well, I've been pretty fortunate in my career. I've had a lot of opportunities and a lot of great mentors that helped me get to where I am today and I appreciate that help. I've had a lot of great teams to work with and I have a great team here in Tucson.
Q. Raytheon is Tucson's largest private employer with about 11,500 employees. How has Raytheon changed the face of Tucson?
A. We are one of the institutions of Tucson. That can be good and it can have some negatives. On the good side, we support the local economy – we support it with high-wage jobs and spend more than $150 million with Arizona suppliers. Many people look to Raytheon as a factor of stability in the community, especially in the last few years when other industries have had a lot of challenges, including construction and real estate. The negative side of that is that we have been here so long – 60 years – that sometimes we are taken for granted.
In the last year or so, when we looked at opportunities for growth, we were limited in our capacity here in Tucson and we found some other communities that were more competitive. That is why we recently broke ground at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Ala., for a 70,000-square-foot Standard Missile production facility. We got a lot of support from the state of Alabama, including significant financial incentives. Going forward, we are still a critical part of the Tucson community, but we need support from the community and the state to grow the business.
Q. Losing that new plant to Huntsville, was a big loss for Tucson because it is a $75 million facility that will employ up to 300 people. I understand that one of the roadblocks to doing that work in Tucson was the lack of a buffer zone around your manufacturing site. Is that correct?
A. Yes. Because of the nature of the work we do – producing missile systems – we need to ensure that we have a proper buffer zone around our facility. We've reached maximum capacity in our existing footprint, which meant we had to look elsewhere to produce the new variant of the Standard Missile. The lack of capacity in Tucson was a factor in the decision to build the new facility in Alabama.
In the past year, we have been encouraged by the support we have received from the City of Tucson and Pima County to address these issues. There is now a proposed plan to create an aerospace and defense corridor that includes infrastructure and transportation improvements that support Raytheon operations as well as the Arizona Air National Guard, the Tucson International Airport and the surrounding community.
Q. What else can be done to help retain and grow your operations in Tucson?
A. If you look at other states, many of them have a very integrated economic development plan that includes the local, state and federal government leaders – and everybody's on the same page. If you look at the news clips from our Huntsville groundbreaking, those in attendance included the mayor of Huntsville, two of the congressional representatives from that area, both of Alabama's U.S. senators and the governor. It was a very integrated approach. You seldom see that type of unified support in Arizona.
Q. From Raytheon's perspective, what are the strengths of operating in Tucson and Arizona?
A. The climate here is wonderful. The fact is that we have beautiful mountains and an amazing amount of outdoor activities available. Our relationships with the state universities and the local educational community are also a big positive.
Q. Is the education system here adequate to support Raytheon's operations?
A. When you look at it from the early years, K-12, I would say there is a lot of room for improvement, particularly when it comes to funding. We do a lot to try to support math and science education in the middle-school years. Having a good education system for primary and secondary education helps us attract good people because they want good schools for their kids. From a higher education standpoint, the system is very good. As a company, we hire more people from the University of Arizona than any other college or university in the country.
Q. Are corporate taxes, property taxes and business taxes a positive factor or a negative one in locating here?
A. Arizona is not as competitive as a number of other states in which we operate. The tax bill passed earlier this year is a step in the right direction, which phases down business personal property and corporate income tax assessments
Q. What tax changes are needed to encourage large corporations like Raytheon to locate in Arizona?
A. Looking at the overall tax infrastructure, renewing the R&D tax credits and those kinds of things that help incentivize us to reinvest in the infrastructure here would be helpful.
Q. Tell us about the Raytheon culture. How do people feel about working at Raytheon? Is it a good place to work and why?
A. I think it is a fantastic place to work. When we do our employee opinion surveys, we get an incredibly high number, I'd say a world-class number of people who indicate they enjoy the environment we have at Raytheon and would recommend Raytheon as an employer of choice to others. If you talk about our culture, we're really a technology culture, an engineering culture. We need journalists and English majors, too, and we have them. But the heart and soul of Raytheon is engineering and technology and everybody else is here to support that. People here accomplish things that are at the cutting edge, including many that we can't discuss because they are classified. People love that culture. It's the mystery of high technology. Raytheon is also a pioneer in making certain we have a diversity of ideas. We focus on bringing in different points of view and we place importance on recruiting from different cultures and backgrounds.
Q. Innovation is obviously a huge part of Raytheon's success. What are the technological innovative milestones in Raytheon's history and in its history in Tucson? How has the company affected the lives of everyday people through these innovations?
A. If you go back to the early days of Raytheon, there was a lot of research into radar. We were a pioneer in the radar arena, which was called on primarily because of the advent of aviation and the need to track aircraft in World Wars I and II. Radar has allowed us to fly more efficiently and effectively, and has led to the advent of better weather prediction. There is a whole industry that we helped spawn and develop.
A sidetrack from a technology standpoint, as we were doing microwave radar technology, was the discovery of the effect that microwaves had on water and food. One of our researchers was work ing on a klystron one day and he noticed that the chocolate bar in his pocket had started to melt. He began to investigate what caused this. He got some popcorn, and that was the beginning of the research that led to the microwave oven, which has had a significant impact on people's everyday lives.
The last example I will give goes back to the days of the Hughes Research Laboratory and the advent of the laser. We were one of the pioneers in the early days of lasers. If you think about what lasers have done – whether it's in CDs or DVDs, or in laser technology for eyes – the impact has been huge.
You never know when things we are working on, in some cases for military applications, will propagate into the commercial world and everyday life. Investments in companies like ours spawn technologies of the future.
Q. Looking toward the future, do you think someday we will be protected by an effective missile defense shield?
A. I think we have the beginnings of an effective missile defense shield today – at least protection against a limited kind of threat. If a rogue nation, like a North Korea or an Iran, launched a limited attack, we have some capability today. That is because of some technologies we built – interceptor technologies and the Standard Missile family of technologies.
Right now we are working on a Phased Adaptive Approach that President Obama has outlined to expand that missile shield to include Europe and our allies there. So, in terms of protecting our country against those kinds of threats, I think we are taking very good steps in that direction.