UPDATE 1-AIRSHOW-Finmeccanica sees muted impact from crisis

* U.S. defence spending stable outside big programmes
* Italy seeing first positive signals on economy
By Deepa Babington
PARIS, June 15 (Reuters) - Italian defence company Finmeccanica (SIFI.MI) on Monday said its order backlog was helping shield it from the economic slump and that U.S. defence spending was holding up despite cuts to big-ticket programmes.
DRS, the U.S. defence technology firm that Finmeccanica acquired last year to gain a foothold in the world's biggest defence market, has already racked up orders worth $2 billion in the first five months of the year, the company said.
"U.S. defence spending remains very stable if you look beyond the big programs," said Finmeccanica Chief Operating Officer Giorgio Zappa told reporters at the Paris air show, saying demand in the logistics and systems segment of the U.S. market remained strong despite the crisis.
Despite its growing presence in the U.S., which has become Finmeccanica's second-largest market after Italy, Finmeccanica has suffered setbacks on major contracts such as the U.S. presidential helicopter and the C-27J cargo plane project.
Finmeccanica intends to stick to its plans to set up an assembly line in the United States for the C-27J project, despite the Pentagon's decision to halve the contract and buy 38 planes instead of the 78 initially planned, Zappa said.
Overall, the company was feeling the pinch from the recession only in the civil aircraft and helicopter segment, thanks to a backlog from orders from governments and other institutional clients, CEO Pierfrancesco Guarguaglini said.
He said comments by governments and reports suggested that Italy was seeing the first "positive" signals in the general economic climate, but Zappa warned signs of recovery in the civil aircraft market had yet to be seen.
Still, Finmeccanica's helicopter unit AgustaWestland on Monday announced orders worth 150 million euros, saying a bulk of them were chalked up in China, Egypt, Turkey, Indonesia and the United States.
Finmeccanica also said it expected to get "good news" this week on a contract for M346 training jets from the Italian armed forces, but did not say how much the contract could be worth.
The company also confirmed that it planned to sell its remaining 3.2 percent stake in chipmaker STMicroelectronics NV (STM.PA).