After starting out as the part of TRW charged with designing the nation’s new intercontinental ballistic missile system, the Aerospace Corporation moved here, across the street from Los Angeles Air Force Base, in 1964. As a federally funded research and development center (like RAND, MITRE, JPL, Sandia, and Los Alamos National Lab), the Aerospace Corporation develops technologies for the federal government, primarily for the Space and Missile Systems Center at Los Angeles Air Force Base, and the National Reconnaissance Office. It also supports programs for NASA, NOAA, and private companies, and specializes in systems engineering for space-based communications, remote sensing, and intelligence satellites. The company has also designed satellite destruction weapons, and studies space debris in its labs. It employs more than 4,000 people, at several locations around the country.