Northrop Grumman (NOC 0.38%) has a problem.
In an era of shrinking defense budgets here at home, Northrop Grumman is the military contractor with the absolute worst record for getting people to buy its products abroad. In the race to diversify revenue streams away from the U.S., Boeing (BA -0.20%), with its mammoth civilian airliner business, is far and away the best diversified company in the defense industry -- drawing 54.5% of its revenues from abroad in 2012.
Even discounting Boeing as an "outlier," though, literally every other major defense firm in the U.S. far outclasses Northrop in the competition to win foreign business. Raytheon (RTN), essentially a pure-play military contractor, gets more than $1 in $4 from abroad -- 25.5%. General Dynamics (GD -0.29%) gets more than $1 in $5 (20.7%). Lockheed Martin (LMT 0.38%) does 17.1% of its business internationally.
And Northrop's magic number: 6.6%.
With America's "sequester" in full swing, and defense budgets falling to the axe, that's a perilous position for Northrop to be in, having so much exposure to a shrinking U.S. defense budget. Yet you've got to hand it to them: By all indications, Northrop has finally recognized its problem. It's decided to do something about it. And what it's doing is trying to capture one of the fastest-growing defense markets on the globe.
How will they do it -- and to whom will they do it? Click through the slideshow below, and we'll lay it all out for you.
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