June 10, 2022 | International, Aerospace
Avions de chasse chinois : Trudeau parle de « provocation », Pékin se défend
Pékin accuse plutôt l'aviation militaire canadienne de mener des « opérations hostiles » dans le Pacifique.
October 29, 2020 | International, Land
https://www.defensenews.com/land/2020/10/27/us-army-gets-first-infantry-squad-vehicle-from-gm-defense/
UPDATE — This story has been updated to correct the location for ISV production in North Carolina. A GM Defense representative previously misspoke.
WASHINGTON — GM Defense delivered its first Infantry Squad Vehicle to the U.S. Army in an Oct. 27 ceremony at its proving grounds and production facility in Milford, Michigan, just 120 days after being chosen to build the new troop carrier.
The Army awarded the company a $214.3 million contract to produce 649 vehicles by the end of fiscal 2024. The service is planning to procure a total of 2,065 ISVs.
Designed to carry a nine-soldier squad, the ISV was specifically put together to be light enough to be sling loaded from a UH-60 Black Hawk and small enough to fit inside a CH-47 Chinook, to provide maximum flexibility for deployment.
GM's design is based off the company's 2020 Chevrolet Colorado ZR2 midsize truck and uses 90 percent commercial parts including a 186-horsepower, 2.8L Duramax turbo-diesel engine and performance race components. It also features a custom rollover protection system.
While the first low-rate initial production vehicles — 27 in total — will be built in Michigan, GM has a long-term plan to move its ISV manufacturing to Concord, North Carolina, where it is standing up a facility to manage its higher volume ISV production.
The Army first identified a need for a light infantry vehicle in 2015 when its most recent combat vehicle strategy was released, but nothing materialized until Congress forced the Army to launch the competition as part of the FY18 National Defense Authorization Act. The Army awarded $1 million contracts to three teams in August 2019 to develop offerings — GM Defense, a team of Oshkosh Defense and Flyer Defense LLC and an SAIC and Polaris team.
“One hundred and twenty days from contract award to delivery is a significant milestone, and I am very proud of the team for this accomplishment,” David Albritton, president of GM Defense, said in a statement. “We're leveraging General Motors' engineering prowess and immense manufacturing capabilities to bring transformative solutions to the military vehicle market. Our initial success with the ISV shows our commitment to our customer and highlights our unique right to win in the military mobility market.”
GM Defense has a “very, very talented team," Albritton said during the ceremony, and “their innovation, attention to detail, flexibility when incorporating soldier feedback during testing and a magnitude of other factors helped us to win this ISV contract and gives me great hope for how we will tackle other pursuits in the future.”
The first vehicles will be going to the 1st Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division, but ultimately 11 IBCTs will be outfitted with 59 vehicles each under the first contract covering the 649 ISVs.
The vehicles are slated to go through tests in the coming year, including further analysis of its air-deployable capability, as well as verification the maintenance manuals are complete. The first unit equipped will take the ISV through an initial operational test and evaluation.
With the success of the ISV, GM Defense is setting its sights on other opportunities with the Army and other military services.
“We have a strong interest in the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle Program,” Albritton said. The Army is planning to re-compete for the JLTV and for new Humvees to round out the tactical vehicle fleet.
“If you look at the size and scale of this program, obviously, this is closer to a commercial-size vehicle, but as you step up in class and step up in weight, we believe we have a right to win in vehicles sizes of that size,” he added.
“That doesn't limit us there, as well. There are only a few ground vehicle programs across the [Defense Department] right now, but we believe that other than doing a fully integrated vehicle like we do on ISV or what we potentially could do on JLTV in partnership with other companies, we can look at programs like the Advanced Reconnaissance Vehicle for the U.S. Marine Corps, or we can look at the Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle," Albritton said. “But if you think about power and propulsion solutions, you think about light weighting, think about cybersecurity, there's other types of capabilities that we can apply in partnership on a variety of platforms as well.”
GM spent several recent years helping the Army evaluate a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle using a ZH2 Chevy Colorado and the Army is now taking some renewed steps at getting after an electric vehicles in its fleet to include the pursuit of an electric light reconnaissance vehicle.
On the same subject
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September 24, 2020 | International, Aerospace
How’s Military Aftermarket Sector Faring Amid COVID-19 Crisis?
Michael Tint The COVID-19 crisis has hit the commercial MRO industry hard. How is the military aftermarket sector faring? Michael Tint, head of defense analytics at Aviation Week, responds: COVID-19 has not caused military aviation anything like the degree of disruption it has for civil aviation. Defense budgets for 2020 were largely allocated before its onset, and there have been only minor reductions in military operations as a result of the pandemic. Procurement has been similarly steady, with only small production delays so far. However, the nature of military budgeting in most countries means that major cuts in spending will not be felt for at least a year or two. Meanwhile, rising global tensions are likely to ensure that defense spending remains a priority—even if the longer-term economic consequences of the pandemic prove severe. Growing Military Engine Repair, 2020-29 (U.S. $ billions) Jet engines powering Western-designed fighters and training aircraft will generate $50.5 billion in maintenance, repair and overhaul demand over the next decade—rising from $4.5 billion in 2020 to $5.6 billion in 2029, for a compound annual growth rate of 2.05%. Most of the growth will come from Pratt & Whitney's F135, the engine on Lockheed Martin's F-35. As military flying continues, so too must military engine maintenance, repair and overhaul. Aviation Week forecasts that $85.4 billion dollars will be spent on depot-level engine maintenance for Western-designed military aircraft over the next decade. Of this total, $50.5 billion will be spent on the engines powering fighters and jet-powered trainers. Demand for these engines will rise from $4.5 billion in 2020 to $5.6 billion in 2029, a compound annual growth rate of 2.05%. General Electric F404/F414s in Boeing's F/A-18 and T-7, Saab's Gripen, and KAI's KF-X and T-50 will produce the largest share of this demand (22.4%), but most of the growth will come from Pratt & Whitney F135s powering Lockheed Martin F-35s. Demand for this engine will rise from $424 million in 2020 to $1.4 billion in 2029, a rate of 14.19% per year https://aviationweek.com/mro/hows-military-aftermarket-sector-faring-amid-covid-19-crisis
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June 10, 2019 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, Security, Other Defence
Contract Awards by US Department of Defense - June 7, 2019
NAVY Lockheed Martin Corp., Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., Fort Worth, Texas, is awarded a $1,808,545,655 cost-plus-incentive-fee, cost-plus-award-fee, cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for continued design maturation and development of Block 4 capabilities in support of the F-35 Lightning II Phase 2.3 Pre-Modernization for the Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps; and non-U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) participants. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, and is expected to be completed in August 2026. Fiscal 2019 research, development, test and evaluation (Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps); and non-U.S. DoD participant funds in the amount of $98,998,910 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract combines purchases for the Air Force ($732,460,990; 40.50 percent); Navy ($371,475,278; 20.54 percent), Marine Corps ($345,974,784; 19.13 percent) and non-U.S. DoD participants ($358,634,603; 19.83 percent). This contract was not competitive procured pursuant to U.S. Code 2304(c)(1). The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00019-19-C-0010). Northrop Grumman Systems Corp., Baltimore, Maryland, is awarded a $958,049,562 firm-fixed-price contract for the procurement of 30 full-rate production Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar units under the portfolio management of Program Executive Officer Land Systems, Quantico, Virginia. This procurement also includes spares parts and retrofit kits. Work will be performed in Linthicum, Maryland (37 percent); East Syracuse, New York (28 percent); Stafford Springs, Connecticut (7 percent); Tulsa, Oklahoma (6 percent); Syracuse, New York (4 percent); Valencia, California (3 percent); San Diego, California (3 percent); Richardson, Texas (3 percent); Farmingdale, New York (2 percent); St. Paul, Minnesota (2 percent); Gilbert, Arizona (1 percent); Phoenix, Arizona (1 percent); Lowell, Massachusetts (1 percent); Littleton, Colorado (1 percent); and Durham, North Carolina (1 percent), and is expected to be complete by Jan. 13, 2025. Fiscal 2019 procurement funds (Marine Corps) in the amount of $194,748,327 will be obligated at the time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract award was not competitively procured in accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-1 and 10 U.S. Code § 2304(c)(1). The Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico, Virginia, is the contracting activity (M67854-19-C-0043). Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine, is awarded a $61,697,197 cost-plus-award-fee modification to previously-awarded contract N00024-18-C-2313 to exercise options for accomplishment of lead yard services (LYS) for the DDG 51-class destroyer program. LYS provides necessary engineering, technical, material procurement and production support; configuration; class flight and baseline upgrades and new technology support; data and logistics management; lessons-learned analysis; acceptance trials; post-delivery test and trials; post-shakedown availability support; reliability and maintainability; system safety program support; material and fleet turnover support; shipyard engineering team; turnkey; crew indoctrination, design tool/design standardization, detail design development, and other technical and engineering analyses for the purpose of supporting DDG 51 Class ship construction and test and trials. In addition, DDG 51 Class LYS may provide design, engineering, procurement and manufacturing/production services to support design feasibility studies and analyses that modify DDG 51-class destroyers for foreign military sales programs sponsored by the Department of the Navy and the Department of Defense. Work will be performed in Bath, Maine (95 percent); Brunswick, Maine (4 percent), and other locations below one percent (1 percent) and is expected to be completed by June 2020. Fiscal 2015, 2016 and 2017 shipbuilding and conversion (Navy) funding in the amount of $58,345,440 will be obligated at time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, District of Columbia, is the contracting activity. L3 Communications MariPro Inc., Goleta, California, is awarded a $41,440,334 cost-plus-fixed-fee, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, sole-source contract to provide support services to sustain U.S. and allied navy training and test and evaluation ranges around the world. L3 will repair or replace original equipment manufacturer systems. Services and associated deliverables include the design, production and installation of both shore electronic systems and ocean sensor system hardware assemblies; operation and maintenance of the delivered hardware to support operational test events of the delivered system, and data products identified in the contract data requirements lists. Other services under this requirement include operating, maintaining, repairing, performing logistics support, refurbishing, modernizing, upgrading, revising, improving, performing information assurance and expanding of range hardware, software and its performance. Work will be performed at various locations throughout the world and is expected to be completed by June 2024. Fiscal 2019 operation and maintenance (Navy) funding in the amount of $245,477 will be obligated at time of award and will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured, in accordance with 10 U.S. Code 2304(c)(1) - only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements. The Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division Newport, Newport, Rhode Island, is the contracting activity (N66604-19-D-A900). AIR FORCE EMC Corp., Irvine, California, has been awarded a $74,423,388 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for instrumentation support, configuration, management, development, loading, integration, analysis and decommutation (ILIAD) and flight test instrumentation systems operation. This contract provides for greater mission capabilities by accessing contractor personnel with specialized training and expertise in utilization and troubleshooting of the ILIAD system. Work will be performed at Edwards Air Force Base and Irvine, California, and is expected to be complete by June 6, 2024. This award is the result of a sole-source acquisition. Fiscal 2019 research and development funds in the amount of $109,387 are being obligated at the time of award. The Air Force Test Center, Directorate of Contracting, Test Range and Specialized Contracting Branch, Edwards AFB, California, is the contracting activity (FA9304-19-D-0001). DEFENSE LOGISTICS AGENCY Science Applications International Corp., Fairfield, New Jersey, has been awarded a maximum $90,000,000 firm-fixed-price, 254-day bridge contract for facilities maintenance, repair, and operations items. This was a sole-source acquisition using justification 10 U.S. Code 2304 (c)(1), as stated in Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-1. Locations of performance are New Jersey, California, Arizona, Nevada, and Utah, with a Feb. 18, 2020, performance completion date. Using military services are Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2019 through 2020 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (SPE8E3-19-D0008). ARMY Quantum Spatial Inc., St. Petersburg, Florida (W912GB-19-D-0021); and Woolpert-Black & Veatch, Beavercreek, Ohio (W912GB-19-D-0022) will compete for each order of the $49,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for surveying and mapping services. Bids were solicited via the internet with 10 received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of June 6, 2024. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Wiesbaden, Germany, is the contracting activity. Encanto Facility Services 2 LLC,* Albuquerque, New Mexico, was awarded a $45,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for maintenance, repair, upgrade and minor construction of real property facilities at Fort Hood, Texas. Bids were solicited via the internet with 10 received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of June 7, 2022. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Fort Worth, Texas, is the contracting activity (W9126G-19-D-0031). Exp Federal, Chicago, Illinois (W912GB-19-D-0013); Stanley COWI JV, Muscatine, Iowa (W912GB-19-D-0014); Black & Veatch, Overland Park, Kansas (W912GB-19-D-0012); and WSP USA Inc., Virginia Beach, Virginia (W912GB-19-D-0015) will compete for each order of the $36,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for general architect and engineering services. Bids were solicited via the internet with five received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of June 6, 2024. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Wiesbaden, Germany, is the contracting activity. Komada LLC,* Colorado Springs, Colorado, was awarded a $22,090,954 firm-fixed-price contract for repair of Teller Dam at Fort Carson, Colorado. Bids were solicited via the internet with seven received. Work will be performed in Fort Carson, Colorado, with an estimated completion date of Oct. 30, 2020. Fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance Army funds in the amount of $22,090,954 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha, Nebraska, is the contracting activity (W9128F-19-C-0028). Medvolt Construction Services LLC,* Kansas City, Missouri, was awarded a $18,058,404 firm-fixed-price contract for construction of flood walls, earthen levees, interior storm water piping, tributary channel realignment and bank stabilization, and detention pond with gatewell, at Swope Park Industrial Area in Kansas City, Missouri. Bids were solicited via the internet with three received. Work will be performed in Kansas City, Missouri, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 28, 2022. Fiscal 2019 civil construction funds in the amount of $18,058,404 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Kansas City, Missouri, is the contracting activity (W912DQ-19-C-1074). The Boeing Co., Ridley Park, Pennsylvania, was awarded a $10,115,993 modification (P00025) to contract W58RGZ-17-C-0059 to support CH-47F Block II Engineering and Manufacturing Development program. Work will be performed in Ridley Park, Pennsylvania, with an estimated completion date of July 27, 2021. Fiscal 2019 research, development, test and evaluation funds in the amount of $10,115,993 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Contracting Command, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, is the contracting activity. Eco & Associates Inc.,* Tustin, California, was awarded a $10,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for architect and engineer services. Bids were solicited via the internet with nine received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 7, 2024. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, San Francisco, California, is the contracting activity (W912P7-19-D-0004). NWI&T Atkins SB JV LLC,* Idaho Falls, Idaho, was awarded a $10,000,000 firm-fixed-price contract for architect and engineer services. Bids were solicited via the internet with nine received. Work locations and funding will be determined with each order, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 7, 2024. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, San Francisco, California, is the contracting activity (W912P7-19-D-0005). WASHINGTON HEADQUARTERS SERVICES Copper River Technologies, Anchorage, Alaska, has been awarded a firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity with a maximum amount of $21,000,000. The contract is to provide professional-level analytical, communication, event management, and logistics services as well as administrative-level general and executive services to provide continuous process improvement, business process reengineering, and organizational efficiencies support services to Facilities Services Directorate (FSD), Space Portfolio Management Division, other FSD Divisions and satisfy Department of Defense, Office of the Secretary of Defense, and Washington Headquarters Services requirements. Work performance will take place in Arlington, Virginia. Fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $3,322,696 are being obligated at time of award. The expected completion date is June 6, 2024. Washington Headquarters Services, Arlington, Virginia, is the contracting activity (HQ0034-19-D-0015). *Small business https://dod.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract-View/Article/1870180/source/GovDelivery/