PASADENA, Calif. – Alliance Spacesystems, Inc. (ASI) was presented with the George M. Low (GML) Award, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) premier quality and performance award for prime and subcontractors at the 19th Continual Improvement and Reinventions Conference, held March 1-2, 2005. ASI was nominated in the category of Small Business–Products by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in July of 2004. While it was ASI’s development of the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) robotic arm that brought the company particular notoriety at JPL this year, ASI was evaluated on the quality, safety, customer satisfaction and technical performance of all of its NASA-related contracts and subcontracts.
“It is a tremendous honor to receive this award,” said René Fradet, CEO of ASI. “We work hard at ASI to provide NASA, and all our customers, with the highest quality engineering and manufacturing possible, and it is gratifying to have that effort recognized.”
Fredrick Gregory, Acting Administrator of NASA, presented the George M. Low Trophy to Fradet at a special luncheon, which concluded the Continual Improvement and Reinventions Conference. Low believed that it was the excellence and quality of the people working on the Apollo missions that made the lunar landings possible, and, therefore, it is appropriate that the trophy takes the shape of an Apollo Command Module and has an embedded medallion which has alloyed in it a portion of an artifact flown to the moon and back on Apollo 11.
The award’s namesake, George M. Low (1926-1984), greatly contributed to the early development of NASA Space Programs during his 27 years of government service. Low’s career and achievements spanned many fields, but his accomplishments were legendary as an engineer, mathematician, scientist, NASA Director and Deputy Administrator, Chairman of the National Research Council, and President of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Low advanced through NASA management on the strength of his extraordinary quality-embedded achievements, making made him a role model for all who knew and worked with him. The GML Trophy is awarded today in honor of the man who stretched the boundaries of excellence, and who motivated others to do the same through his example. The presentation of the GML Award signifies NASA’s recognition that the award recipient has demonstrated excellence and outstanding technical and managerial achievements in quality and performance.
For more information about NASA’s GML Award, please visit http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codeq/gml/gmlman.htm.
About Alliance Spacesystems, Inc.: ASI is a leading provider of mechanical systems for the most demanding aerospace and commercial applications. ASI provides robotics, mechanisms, composite structures and mechanical analyses for systems operating in extreme environments. ASI’s innovative products have seen use in interplanetary spacecraft, telecommunications and scientific satellites and challenging terrestrial applications. Its technical staff has a broad range of direct experience on over eighty space programs ranging from deep-space and Mars missions to numerous low-cost small satellites. The privately held firm’s core competencies include space vehicle systems engineering, mechanisms, structural and dynamics analysis, structural system design, structural dampers and actuators. See more at www.asi-space.com.
