27 janvier 2024 | International, Aérospatial
2 avril 2019 | International, Terrestre
Army drops request for proposals to build next-gen combat vehicle prototypes
By: Jen Judson
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army on Friday issued a request for proposals to competitively build next-generation combat vehicle prototypes.
The RFP opens up competition for industry to provide optionally manned fighting vehicle prototype designs. From that pool, the Army will choose — in the second quarter of fiscal 2020 — up to two teams to build 14 prototypes.
The OMFV is intended to replace the Bradley Fighting Vehicle starting in 2026 and is designed to better operate in future environments that would allow soldiers to maneuver to a position of advantage and “to engage in close combat and deliver decisive lethality during the execution of combined arms maneuver,” an Army statement reads.
Some of the threshold requirements for OMFV are a 30mm cannon and a second-generation forward-looking infrared system, or FLIR. Objective requirements are a 50mm cannon and a third-generation FLIR.
“The OMFV must exceed current capabilities while overmatching similar threat class systems,” Brig. Gen. Ross Coffman, the director for the Next-Generation Combat Vehicle Cross-Functional Team, said in the statement. “It must be optimized for dense urban areas while also defeating pacing threats on rural terrain.”
The NGCV CFT is part of a new four-star command, Army Futures Command, that is designed to modernize the force. NGCV is the second-highest modernization priority for the Army just behind long-range precision fires.
After working with industry through a multitude of engagements and testing several draft RFPs with ambitious requirements, Coffman believes the Army has both the threshold requirements for the vehicle as well as the right objective requirements as the service heads toward the release of the final RFP.
“We put out a very aggressive draft RFP,” Coffman told reporters March 27 at the Association of the U.S. Army's Global Force Symposium, because the CFT knew it was not obtainable in its entirety.
The draft RFP was meant to stretch goals and objectives and to inspire feedback to ultimately write requirements that are attainable, Coffman explained.
The Army's current approach to enter into a rapid prototyping effort truncates what could be a two- or three-year technology-maturation and risk-reduction phase, Maj. Gen. Brian Cummings, the program executive officer for Ground Combat Systems, noted in the statement.
“It is about being able to prototype and field required capabilities on an accelerated schedule to get capability into soldiers' hands quickly,” he said.
The Army's acquisition chief, Bruce Jette, approved a rapid prototyping approach for the OMFV in September 2018, which requires a prototype demonstration in an operational environment within five years, according to the statement.
The prototypes will go through “rigorous” operational testing and soldier assessments.
The Army plans to downselect to one vehicle for low-rate initial production following the assessments and testing.
Several companies have come forward either with clear plans of what they would like to offer or declaring they will participate in the competition.
German company Rheinmetall announced last fall that it would team up with Raytheon to provide its new Lynx combat vehicle. It's also possible its Puma vehicle, which is co-manufactured with German defense firm Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, could be submitted. BAE Systems showed what it could do with a CV90 vehicle at the Association of the U.S. Army's annual show in the fall, and General Dynamics European Land Systems turned heads at AUSA with a Griffin III technology demonstrator equipped with a 50mm cannon.
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19 juin 2019 | International, Aérospatial
US Air Force looks to fast track cash to Kratos Defense for more Valkyrie drones
By: Valerie Insinna LE BOURGET, France — Things are looking up for Kratos Defense's XQ-58A Valkyrie drone. Fresh off its second flight, the U.S. Air Force is considering buying 20-30 aircraft for further experimentation, the service's acquisition executive said Monday. “I'm now looking at ways to do that and what the cost will be,” Will Roper told reporters on the sidelines of Paris Air Show, saying that the Air Force is looking for prototyping funds that it can access for a rapid procurement of those aircraft. The XQ-5A Valkyrie is an “attritable” drone, the word the military uses for an asset that can be reused but is cheap enough that a commander could use them aggressively and would expect — and be comfortable with — some losses in combat. What sets Valkyrie apart is not only its low price point, which Kratos estimates will be $2 million per copy in a production run of 100 jets or more, but also the aircraft's near supersonic speed, long endurance and maneuverability, which could make it a formidable partner for manned fighter jets. Once the Air Force buys additional Valkyrie drones, the idea would be to pair those unmanned aircraft with manned fighter jets. “Depending on what comes out of that campaign, the idea would be to look and do a program of record. You'd want to start spiraling the development,” Roper said. A decision on starting a program could be made as soon as fiscal 2021, and from there it would be only two to three years to begin production and fielding aircraft, he said. “I am really pleased we're getting strong buy-in, strong appetite at the pointy end for attritable systems by our pilots.” Roper's comments come after another milestone for the Valkyrie — the second flight demo, held June 11 at Yuma Proving Grounds. According to a Kratos release, the aircraft completed unspecified objectives over a 71 minute test. “With this most recent milestone, the readiness of the XQ-58A is accelerating and increasing the near-term application opportunities for the system,” said Steve Fendley, the company's president of its unmanned systems division. “I am extremely proud of our development, production, and test teams who continue to deliver successful results, in record time, on our comprehensive system level efforts — rare within the aerospace and defense industry." The Air Force Research Laboratory is partnered with Kratos to develop Valkyrie through the Low Cost Attritable Strike Demonstrator program, the service's effort to field a “Loyal Wingman”-style drone that can be flown alongside a fighter jet or other combat aircraft in manned-unmanned teams. But Roper has alluded to even more ambitious plans for Valkyrie or other attritable drones like it. Not only does the Air Force want to add sensors and weapons to Valkyrie, but it wants to implant artificial intelligence in the drone so that it can train and learn alongside pilots, eventually growing in skill and becoming able to respond independently to threats. Roper calls that effort “Skyborg” and in May told Defense News that the service was considering how to incorporate it with manned fighters like the F-35 and the F-15EX. “I don't want this to just be a laboratory project that lives and dies there in a petri dish. I want this to become a program,” he told reporters in March. “I want to see real, operational demonstrations within a couple years. And I will push them to be faster than that.” https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/paris-air-show/2019/06/17/us-air-force-looking-to-fast-track-cash-to-kratos-defense-for-additional-valkyrie-drones/
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17 novembre 2024 | International, Terrestre
Patria to provide 56 additional armoured command and control vehicles for Latvia
Production of the vehicles will utilize local industry capabilities in Latvia, including Patria’s armoured vehicle production facility in Valmiera, opened in May 2024