June 29 (Reuters) - U.S. defense contractor L3Harris Technologies Inc (LHX.N) said on Tuesday Christopher Kubasik has replaced William Brown as its new chief executive officer. The planned transition was announced in October 2018 as part of the company"s merger with Harris Corp. Kubasik, a former Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N) executive, most recently was the chief operating officer of L3Harris. L3Harris said in March it plans to return billions in cash from recent divestitures to shareholders while allowing its new CEO to invest in research and development as the company aims for more Pentagon space sensor contracts. read more