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Even with today's tighter budgets, federal contractors in Maryland should still see more opportunities than those in most other states, executives with contractors and state officials said this week.

The key, says one executive, will be nimbleness.

"Prime contractors will have an increased emphasis on innovation and agility," Babak Nouri, vice president and small business program director with McLean, Va., military and technology contractor Science Applications International Corp., told a crowd of more than 200 business and government executives on Monday. SAIC is one of the top private employers in Maryland with some 6,500 employees, according to state figures.

"How quick can you move?" Nouri asked at a first-time federal contracting conference organized by the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration complex in Silver Spring.

Federal agencies are expected to spend as much as 10 percent less in procurements this fiscal year than last year, said Tom Albro, a principal with technology consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton, also of McLean.

"That will certainly be a challenge for many contractors," Albro said.

But with the expected increase in jobs related to the Pentagon's base realignment process and strength in the cybersecurity and health care sectors, Maryland is "uniquely positioned as a beacon in the storm," Nouri said.

Some military agencies in Maryland have reported that the spending drop-off in the state is smaller than in most other states, said retired Marine Gen. J. Michael Hayes, director of the Office of Military and Federal Affairs under DBED.

"While it will be a tight environment, it is always unpredictable," Hayes said. "You have to stay flexible."

In the last fiscal year, federal agencies awarded some $34 billion in contracts to Maryland companies, according to state figures. That has grown in most recent years and is up from only $9 billion in 1989, said Kevin F. Kelly, chairman of the state Federal Facilities Advisory Board.

The Pentagon budget will still be "very large," and areas such as cybersecurity, energy, health care and life sciences are "expected to endure," said Walter P. Havenstein, CEO of SAIC and former president of Rockville military contractor BAE Systems.

Small businesses are key subcontractors with SAIC, as last fiscal year the company awarded $2.2 billion, or 20 percent of its total revenues, to small businesses, he said. "They are really at the heart of what we do," Havenstein said.

He also called on government officials to do more to develop the state's infrastructure and employ a "regional approach."

Bethesda military and aerospace giant Lockheed Martin also subcontracts with many smaller businesses and has 56 supplier professionals to help guide potential subcontractors through the process, said MacArthur DeShazer, director of small-business development.

"Do your homework," he said. "Be able to say what value you can bring to the contract."

Maricom Systems, a Baltimore information technology company, has grown to some 200 employees, mostly through federal contracting with agencies such as the Department of Health and Human Services, said CEO Maria Beckett. The business will probably employ enough people by the end of 2011 to outgrow the small-business designation, she said.

Obtaining certification and teaming with other companies are key factors in winning federal contracts, Beckett said.

kshay@gazette.net