Hartford Business Journal

HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | JANUARY 12, 2026 15 5 TO WATCH controls with a fly-by-wire system integrated with Sikorsky's MATRIX autonomy technology. The company has also unveiled its Nomad future family of aircraft, designed to take off, hover and land vertically while cruising on wings for longer-range missions. Nomad aircraft are operated using MATRIX autonomy and rely primarily on hybrid-electric propulsion. These projects are aimed at serving the U.S. military's Future Vertical Lift (FVL) initiative — a 20-year quest to develop the next generation of verti- cal-lift aircraft. One of the program's goals, Benton said, is to introduce greater flexibility into legacy aircraft programs that have long anchored the more-than-century-old company. But rivals are also in the hunt for the Future Vertical Lift program — and Bell's win for the Black Hawk replacement showed that some are nipping at Sikorsky's heels. Bell's MV-75 is a tiltrotor aircraft that first flew in 2017. The production model is expected to be in flight testing in 2026, with first deploy- ment slated for 2030. Bell has said it can cruise at twice the speed of a Black Hawk. Benton is philosophical about the loss of the replacement contract. "We continue to invest to modernize the Black Hawk," he said. "It still has a very bright future." Benton said the Army plans to keep the Black Hawk in its inventory poten- tially through 2070, and Sikorsky recently received a $43 million contract to re-engineer aspects of the aircraft. The U-Hawk initiative is one example of how the legacy Black Hawk program is being modernized, including options for unmanned and autonomous flight. Another is the development of so-called "launched effects," small autonomous drones that could be deployed by a Black Hawk crew to create a coordinated "swarm" during combat operations. Alongside the military programs, Sikorsky also has an important roster of commercial customers, including fire departments. The company's S70i Firehawk played a significant role in fighting California's recent devas- tating wildfires, and Sikorsky is part- nering with the state's Department of Forestry and Fire Protection to apply more of its autonomous technology to the aircraft. Meanwhile, the company is also expanding the market for its S92 helicopter, which is traditionally used in the offshore oil and gas industry. Benton says the aircraft is increasingly in demand for VIPs and heads of state. Benton said expanding the use of artificial intelligence will be another priority in 2026, supported by Lock- heed Martin's AI center in nearby Shelton. He said the company is using AI-driven tools to sift through vast amounts of data, identify the most relevant information and speed decision-making. AI is already being used on the shop floor to accelerate production and improve aircraft maintenance, helping extend the service life of Sikorsky aircraft while reducing costs. Benton said he's optimistic about Sikorsky's prospects in the coming year and the pace of change underway at the company. "We're accelerating the pace that we're innovating and deploying things, taking it from decades down to years," he said. Cranes lift a 12,000-pound gearbox into a CH-53K heavy-lift helicopter on Sikorsky's final assembly line in Stratford. Contributed Photo Global Push Amid decline in international students, University of New Haven President Frederiksen maps out growth agenda for 2026 By Michael Juliano mjuliano@hartfordbusiness.com U niversity of New Haven President Jens Frederiksen is heading into 2026 with an ambitious agenda that includes launching a new innovation center, opening a satellite campus in Saudi Arabia, returning the university's business school to the main West Haven campus and upgrading its athletic center. "The many significant projects and initiatives we are pursuing are a direct reflection of our growth and the university's increasing visibility," he told the Hartford Business Journal. Frederiksen, a Denmark native, joined the University of New Haven in March 2024 from Fisk University, a historically Black university in Nashville, Tennessee, where he served as executive vice president for institutional advancement and enrollment management. He has also served as a professor at his alma mater, Vanderbilt University, and the University of the South, and as a consultant for the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. Since arriving at the University of New Haven, he's been focused on growing the university in the U.S. and abroad. Last year, the school — with just under 9,300 students and campuses in West Haven, Orange and Italy — announced plans to transition its athletics program to NCAA Division I competition, a multiyear move that aims to significantly raise the institu- tion's national profile. New innovation center One of the first major projects to take shape under Frederiksen's tenure is the university's new Center for Innovation & Applied Technology. He hosted an open house in November for the 130,000-square-foot facility, located on 12 acres near the school's main West Haven campus. The building, which previously housed discount home-goods retailer Railroad Salvage, is designed to serve as a hub where students and compa- nies collaborate on production, auto- mation and applied research projects. The ultimate goal, Frederiksen said, is to give students real-world experience that makes them more appealing to prospective employers upon graduation. The university has raised about $10 million in private funding toward a $25 million campaign for the center and expects to begin building out dedicated spaces for corporate partners this spring. "There are two or three large companies that have definitely expressed an interest," he said. While he declined to name them, he cited Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., Medtronic and Pratt & Whitney as examples of companies the university has worked with previously and that would be well suited for the center. In November, the university announced the center had entered into a master research agreement with Bausch+Strobel, a German manufacturer of pharmaceutical packaging equipment that operates a Continued on next page

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