The Army on Wednesday awarded BAE Systems a $754.3 million production order for more Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicles (AMPV).
Work on the new full-rate production for AMPVs is expected to be completed by the end of February 2027, according to a Pentagon contracts announcement.
The Army in August 2023 approved AMPV for full-rate production and then awarded BAE Systems a contract worth up to $1.6 billion, which included an initial $432.6 million AMPV order and earlier contract modifications for long-lead materials totaling $365.3 million (Defense Daily, Sept. 1 2023).
BAE Systems’ AMPV is the Army’s replacement for its legacy M113 armored personnel carriers, with the service reaching the “first unit equipped” marker for the new platform in March (Defense Daily, March 14 2023).
The number of AMPVs covered under the new full-rate production order was not disclosed in DoD’s contract announcement.
The Army has previously said it is working toward a goal of annually delivering “a brigade and a half” worth of AMPVs within two years, which would include BAE Systems increasing production from 12 to around 16 vehicles per month.
Jim Miller, BAE Systems’ vice president of business development for combat mission systems, previously detailed efforts to expand production capacity for AMPV at its York, Pa., production facility, to include investing $250 million into the plant and moving around other manufacturing activities (Defense Daily, March 31 2023).
BAE Systems has developed a new External Mission Equipment Package universal top plate for AMPV designed for rapid integration of new payloads, with the company having demonstrated a C-UAS payload on the platform, and it also recently delivered a turreted mortar variant to the Army for upcoming testing (Defense Daily, March 8).