August 22, 2018 | International, Aerospace
By: Sam LaGrone
The next phase of the Navy's effort to replace its decades-old ALQ-99 jamming systems on its fleet of electronic warfare aircraft is in a holding pattern amid a protest from a company cut from the competition, USNI News has learned.
As part of rapid acquisition push for the new jamming technology, the Navy is splitting up the Next Generation Jammer (NGJ) ALQ-99 replacement work into three increments based on the frequencies the system must block – high-band, mid-band and low-band – to help shield U.S. aircraft from anti-air radar systems.
In 2013, Raytheon won a $276 million award for the first portion of the NGJ project – the ALQ-249 mid-band jamming part of the new system – and was awarded an additional $1.2 billion for the work in 2016.
In late 2017, Naval Air Systems Command announced a “demonstration of existing technology” contract to shape how it would pursue the low-band increment. The work would create “[a] demonstration that will lead to an assessment of the maturity level of the technologies that might be applied to a low band jammer pod,” a NAVAIR spokesperson told USNI News in a statement on Tuesday. “This will help inform the appropriate acquisition strategy of the program.”
Last month, L3 and a team of Northrop Grumman and Harris were selected to move forward from a field of four competitors that also included Raytheon and a Lockheed Martin and Cobham team, USNI News has learned. Soon afterwards, Raytheon filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office, arguing it should have been selected to move forward with the low-band jammer effort.
Both L3 and the Northrop Grumman/Harris team confirmed that their low-band tech was selected for potential further study by NAVIAR but referred additional questions to the Navy due to the ongoing protest from Raytheon.
“We have a mature and exceedingly capable offering for Next-Generation Jammer Low Band,” a Northrop spokesman told USNI News in a statement. “Northrop Grumman stands ready to demonstrate that technology.”
USNI News understands a Lockheed Martin/Cobham team was not selected for further study. A Lockheed spokesperson referred questions to the Navy citing the protest.
In a short statement, Raytheon implied the Navy did not fully take into account the benefits of the company's existing investment into the ALQ-249 mid-band jamming technology.
“We believe there were errors in the government's evaluation,” Dana Carroll, a Raytheon spokeswoman, told USNI News in a statement. “Our low-risk, open architecture pod effectively and affordably counters modern threats while maximizing reuse of proven technology and taxpayer investment.”
The GAO has until October to reach a decision on Raytheon protest.
The Next Generation Jammer program has been a weak point the Navy's push to revitalize its aerial electronic warfare portfolio after the service shrugged off developing an improved capability for years in favor of other priorities. The program was placed on the backburner for years while the U.S. was mostly engaged in conflicts with largely uncontested airspace.
Full article: https://news.usni.org/2018/08/21/l3-northrop-selected-next-generation-jammer-work-program-stalled-raytheon-protest
June 28, 2021 | International, Land
One of the new features is the NEFER, an unmanned turret system, which was unveiled with the armored combat vehicle during an exhibition this month.
August 12, 2020 | International, Naval
By: David B. Larter WASHINGTON – The U.S. Navy Saturday commissioned its latest littoral combat ship amid a top-level push to fix the ship's nagging reliability issues and forge a path to make the small surface combatants useful in the years ahead. The monohull Freedom-variant LCS St. Louis was commissioned at a private event in its namesake city, the 22nd LCS and 10th Freedom variant to join the fleet. There will be 35 LCS in the fleet once all are commissioned. Change is in the wind for LCS once again, which has already seen several shakeups to its system. A high-level effort is underway to address problems with its complicated drive train built for high speeds that have limited the ships availability for tasking as well as to finally field its long-delayed mission packages. Mission packages will make the ships either a surface warfare hull, a mine hunter or an antisubmarine ship. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday told Defense News in a July 16 interview that he was preparing to increase LCS deployments by two-and-a-half times over the next two years to finally shake out how to best employ the ships, as well as develop a plan to finally field the mine and ASW mission modules. “There are things in the near term that I have to deliver, that I'm putting heat on now, and one of them is LCS,” Gilday said. “One part is sustainability and reliability. We know enough about that platform and the problems that we have that plague us with regard to reliability and sustainability, and I need them resolved. “That requires a campaign plan to get after it and have it reviewed by me frequently enough so that I can be sighted on it. Those platforms have been around since 2008 — we need to get on with it. Experts who spoke to Defense News in July said the Navy would most likely need to accept less capability than they had planned for the ships to have if the service is to get the most out of the ships. https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2020/08/10/us-navy-commissions-another-littoral-combat-ship-amid-renewed-push-to-fix-the-program/
July 23, 2024 | International, Aerospace