Sonja Alexander
Headquarters, Washington       September 23, 2002
(Phone: 202/358-1761)

RELEASE: 02-182

NASA HONORS OUTSTANDING MINORITY CONTRACTORS

     NASA has named QSS Group, Inc., as its Minority 
Contractor of the Year; GB Tech, Inc., as its Minority 
Subcontractor of the Year; and TechTrans International, Inc., 
as its Women Owned Business of the Year. The three firms will 
be honored at the agency's annual Minority Business and 
Advocates Awards ceremony at 2:30 p.m. EDT on September 24, 
2002, at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

All awards will be conferred by NASA Administrator Sean 
O'Keefe, who will describe the state of small business at NASA 
during the ceremony, to be carried live on NASA Television. 
The Minority Business and Advocates Awards ceremony is held in 
conjunction with Minority Enterprise Development Week.

QSS is headquartered in Lanham, Md., and is a prime contractor 
at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. The 
company provides a broad range of research and development for 
the Computational Science Division in artificial intelligence, 
knowledge-based systems, autonomy and robotics, neuro-
engineering and flight control, automated software 
engineering, and collaborative and assistant systems.

GB Tech, Inc., of Houston is a strategic partner with The 
Boeing Company on the International Space Station program, 
providing safety, reliability and hardware quality assurance, 
as well as software quality assurance and software-development 
integration-laboratory operational support.

TechTrans International, Inc., also headquartered in Houston, 
is a prime contractor to NASA's Johnson Space Center in 
Houston. TechTrans supports the U.S.-Russian space programs, 
providing translation, interpretation, language training and 
logistics support services in the United States and Russia. 
Some of the more complicated translation subjects include: 
engineering specifications and requirements; engineering 
analyses and drawings; safety and hazard control; computer 
program documentation; operations data files (crew 
procedures); medical baseline data collection; and biomedical 
and life sciences documents.

NASA is also recognizing outstanding advocates for their 
contributions and innovative approaches to utilizing minority 
and women owned businesses. Carl Silski (Small Business) from 
NASA's Glenn Research Center, Cleveland, and Mark Stiles 
(Procurement) and Arthur Goldman (Technical), both from NASA's 
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala., will receive 
NASA's Exceptional Achievement Medal.

In addition, Special Recognition Awards will be conferred for 
specific accomplishments and outstanding contributions to the 
Minority-Owned Business Technology Transfer Consortium, 
Washington; the U.S. Pan-Asian American Chamber of Commerce, 
Washington; and Maximino Solis, President of BST Systems, 
Inc., Plainfield, Conn.

Finally, five NASA field centers will be recognized for 
meeting or exceeding all negotiated socio-economic business 
goals for fiscal year 2001. They are Dryden Flight Research 
Center, Edwards, Calif.; Glenn Research Center; Langley 
Research Center, Hampton, Va.; Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 
Pasadena, Calif.; and Ames Research Center.

NASA TV is broadcast on GE-2, transponder 9C, C-Band, located 
at 85 degrees West longitude. The frequency is 3880.0 MHz. 
Polarization is vertical and audio is monaural at 6.8 MHz.

For more information and a full list of winners, visit the 
NASA Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Web site at:

http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codek/

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