WASHINGTON
— Atlanta-based
EMS
Technologies Inc. said Nov. 11 that Paul Domorski is out as the company’s president and chief executive officer effective immediately. He is being replaced by Neilson Mackay,
EMS
’s chief operating officer, the company said in a press release.

Domorski, who had been on the job since 2006, also gave up his seat on the
EMS
board of directors, the press release said.

The move comes a week after the company reported third-quarter earnings of $5.8 million on revenue of $85.7 million, both down slightly from the same three months in 2008. Domorski told investors Nov. 5 that market conditions had “hurt the short-term outlook for some of our business areas” but had “not dampened our confidence in the market potential of our products and technologies.”

The third-quarter results were attributed to sharp declines in
EMS
’s aviation division. The company’s defense and space division, on the other hand, reported third-quarter sales of $23.1 million and an operating income of $2.2 million, the latter representing a year-over-year increase of 46 percent.

EMS
attributed the increase to a multimillion-dollar award related to the U.S. Air Force’s Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellite communications system.

John Mowell, chairman of the
EMS
board, told Space News the management change was effective immediately. In a written statement, he thanked Domorski for his service and praised Mackay for his “experience and in-depth operational and technical skills.”

Mackay ran
EMS
SATCOM, the company’s satellite communications division, before becoming chief operating officer. He joined
EMS
in 1993 when it acquired the Ottawa-based satellite communications business he had been running.

Domorski is not the first senior
EMS
executive to depart this year. In August, David A. Smith abruptly resigned as vice president and general manager of the defense and space division less than two weeks after the unit reported 30 percent growth.

Brian Berger is editor in chief of SpaceNews.com and the SpaceNews magazine. He joined SpaceNews.com in 1998, spending his first decade with the publication covering NASA. His reporting on the 2003 Space Shuttle Columbia accident was...