Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert called it one of Utah's best-kept secrets. Sen. Orrin Hatch described it as "a true Utah business success story." A corporate executive hailed it as "truly a national asset" and "truly an American success story."

"It" is Communication Systems-West, a 2,300-employee operation that on Wednesday marked its 50th year of existence with a celebratory luncheon at the Grand America hotel.

"I believe . . . you may be one of the best-kept secrets we have in Utah," Herbert said. "You pay well, you have technology that is significant, I know you are a leading recruiter out of the University of Utah for engineers, and yet probably a lot of the masses out there are not as familiar with L-3 Communications as they probably ought to be."

One reason is the type of work that is CSW's specialty, much of which is classified. The division of L-3 Communications Holdings Inc. supplies data links and mobile satellite terminals for the military, helping U.S. fighting forces with intelligence collection, surveillance, reconnaissance and image processing.

Another reason for L-3's low profile may be its constant name-changing. The operation started in 1956 with 60 engineers, but it was known as Sperry Utah Engineering Laboratories as it began working as an Army contractor integrating and manufacturing the Sergeant missile. The Sperry Univac division later merged with Burroughs to become Unisys. Unisys Defense Systems was purchased by Loral in 1994, and the company became part of Lockheed Martin when Lockheed acquired Loral's defense business in 1996. In 1997, CSW was the largest division spun out from Lockheed, which formed a new business unit from 10 of its former divisions, with ownership divided between Lockheed Martin, a pair of Lockheed executives having names beginning with "L," and Lehman Brothers.

"L-3 Communication Systems-West is a true Utah business success story," Hatch, R-Utah, told the crowd of about 200. "Your company and employees have been an integral part of Utah for a half-century, and no one can dispute the strategic advantage that your company has provided to our nation's men and women in uniform.

"Much of the work that Communication Systems-West performs is of a highly classified nature. However, I can say that the real-time, worldwide dissemination of images and information gathered by the U-2 and our new unmanned aerial vehicles, such as Global Hawk and the Predator, is only possible because of the hard work by all of you at Communication Systems-West."

Hatch said the public "can't understand" or "won't know" about CSW's work.

"It's not an exaggeration to say that the technologies created and built by Communication Systems-West have won battles for the United States and, equally as important, saved countless Americans' lives," Hatch said.