science

L3 Technologies

L3 Technologies is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand L3 Technologies rather than just read about it. In short: L3 Technologies, formerly L-3 Communications Holdings, was an American company that supplied command and control, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C3ISR) systems and products, avionics, ocean products, training devices and services, instrumentation, aerospace, and navigation products. Its customers included the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, United States Intell…

Key takeaways

L3 Technologies belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect L3 Technologies to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of L3 Technologies from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

L3 Technologies, formerly L-3 Communications Holdings, was an American company that supplied command and control, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C3ISR) systems and products, avionics, ocean products, training devices and services, instrumentation, aerospace, and navigation products. Its customers included the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, United States Intelligence Community, NASA, aerospace contractors, and commercial telecommunications and wireless customers. In 2019, it merged with Harris Corporation to form L3Harris Technologies. L3 was headquartered in Murray Hill, Manhattan, New York City.

History L3 was formed as L-3 Communications in 1997 to acquire certain business units from Lockheed Martin that had previously been part of Loral Corporation. These units had belonged to Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta, which had merged three years before in 1993. The company was founded by (and named for) Frank Lanza and Robert LaPenta in partnership with Lehman Brothers. Lanza and LaPenta had both served as executives at Loral and Lockheed.

Acquisitions

1997 Paramax Systems Corporation from Lockheed Martin. Loral had acquired Paramax in 1995

2000 Training & Simulation Division of Raytheon Systems Co., based in Arlington, Texas. This company was formerly known as Hughes Training, Inc., and part of the Hughes Aircraft Defense Group purchased by Raytheon from General Motors two years earlier. The division traced its ancestry to the original company formed by Edwin Link, inventor of the Link Trainer airplane simulator, and was renamed accordingly Link Simulation and Training (later Link Training and Simulation).

2001 KDI Precision Products, Batavia, Ohio. Electronic fuzing, safe and arm devices. Litton Electron Devices from Northrop Grumman (renamed L3 Electron Devices)

2002 Raytheon Aircraft Integration Systems (renamed L3 Integrated Systems; the Greenville, Texas facility is now known as L3 Mission Integration Division, while the Waco, Texas facility is now known as L3 Platform Integration Division) SyColeman Corporation, which came about from the joining of Sy Technologies and Coleman Research Corporation PerkinElmer Detection Systems from PerkinElmer which became L-3 Security & Detection Systems Wescam (currently named L3 Harris Wescam), developer of gyro-stabilized, EO-IR imaging systems

2003 Ship Analytics, Inc. BF Goodrich Avionics L-3 Communication MAS from Bombardier Aerospace

2004 Cincinnati Electronics, Mason, Ohio. Infrared detectors & systems, space avionics. Raytheon Commercial Infrared, Richardson Texas. Infrared detectors .

2005 Titan Corp., after a failed buyout attempt by Lockheed Martin L-3 Communication Combat Propulsion Systems, previously owned by General Dynamics Land Systems L-3 Communications MAPPS, previously CAE's Marine Controls unit Electron Dynamic Devices from Boeing Satellite Systems Applied Signal & Image Technology, Linthicum Heights, MD. Geo-location systems for RF emitters. Sonoma Design Group, Santa Rosa, CA. Stabilized EO/IR sensors.

2006 Advanced System Architectures, based in Fleet, Hampshire, United Kingdom. L-3 ASA has core capabilities in the development and through-life management of complex information systems, data fusion and tracking solutions, and interoperable secure communications systems. Crestview Aerospace, based in northwest Florida. Crestview Aerospace provides aircraft structures, major airframe assemblies, and military aircraft modifications for leading prime contractors and OEMs in the aerospace industry. (sold in 2017 along with Vertex Aerospace and TCS) Nautronix and MariPro, based in Fremantle, Australia and Santa Barbara, California, respectively, from Nautronix plc in Aberdeen, Scotland. Nautronix and MariPro provide acoustic ranges and hydrographics to commercial and defense markets. TRL Technology, a specialist defense electronics company based in Gloucestershire, England. TRL Technology is internationally known for development and innovation in the fields of interception, surveillance, electronic warfare, and communications.

2010 Insight Technology, based in Londonderry, New Hampshire. Insight develops and builds optics, from night-vision goggles to weapon-mounted sights and lasers.

2012 Thales Training & Simulation (TTSL – partial acquisition), a Thales subsidiary manufacturing civil and military full flight simulators. In August 2012, L-3 acquired TTSL's civil fixed-wing simulation business based in Crawley, UK, integrating it into L-3 Link Simulation & Training. The division was later renamed L3 Commercial Training Solutions, and then L3 Commercial Aviation Solutions. In 2023, the business was sold to private equity firm TJC, becoming part of Acron Aviation.

2015 CTC Aviation Group, a commercial pilot training school based in Southampton, UK. The school was rebranded L-3 CTC.

2016 Aerosim Flight Academy in Sanford, Florida and Aerosim Technologies in Burnsville, Minnesota. Both the Sanford school and L-3 CTC were integrated into L3 Commercial Training Solutions and rebranded L3 Airline Academy. MacDonald Humfrey (Automation), a Luton, UK–based checkpoint security and automation company ExMac (Automation), a Droitwich, UK-based automated material handling company.

2017 Open Water Power, a Somerville, Massachusetts–based battery startup spun out of MIT. Its novel aluminum-water battery technology promises a tenfold improvement in the endurance of unmanned underwater vehicles. Ocean-Server Technology, a Fall River, Massachusetts–based small business specializing in lithium-ion battery, sensor, and robotic mini-sub (UUV) products ASV Global, a Lafayette, Louisiana–based business with international offices in Portchester specializing in Autonomous Surface Vehicles for commercial and defense markets.

2018 In October 2018, L3 announced an all-stock "merger of equals" with Florida-based Harris Corporation, to be closed (subject to approvals) in mid-2019. The merger was completed on June 29, 2019, and the new company, L3Harris Technologies, Inc., is based in Melbourne, Florida, where Harris was headquartered.

Business organization As of 2017, L3 was organized under four business segments:

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with L3 Technologies

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what L3 Technologies claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to L3 Technologies before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about L3 Technologies ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of L3 Technologies

In research: L3 Technologies appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses L3 Technologies in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: L3 Technologies is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1997 establishments in New York (state), 2019 disestablishments in New York (state), 2019 mergers and acquisitions, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for L3 Technologies outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study L3 Technologies in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what L3 Technologies means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain L3 Technologies out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is L3 Technologies in simple terms?

Why does L3 Technologies matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study L3 Technologies?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on L3 Technologies.