BAE Systems and General Dynamics [GD] both announced Thursday they have submitted proposals for the Army’s Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle (OMFV) competition.
After sitting out the Army’s first attempt at OMFV, BAE Systems said it will work with partners, including
Elbit Systems of America [ESLT], on an “advanced armored vehicle” for the rebooted Bradley replacement program.
“BAE Systems is designing a combat system that will meet, with exceptional growth, the Army’s requirements for their Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle program. With partners such as Elbit Systems of America and others, we are confident in our ability to deliver capabilities and technologies that will ensure our Soldiers are unmatched on the battlefield. We look forward to sharing more about our offering as the competition continues,” Amanda Niswonger, spokesperson for BAE Systems, told Defense Daily.
While BAE Systems said it is not sharing specifics on its offering at this time, the company did note that Elbit America is providing the design of the vehicle’s integrated turret.
General Dynamics was the sole competitor to submit a physical bid sample during the Army’s first attempt at OMFV, before the service canceled the original acquisition effort in January 2020.
“Our innovative digital engineering approaches ensure that as requirements evolve throughout the platform’s lifecycle, the digital tools necessary to efficiently update our design are maintained in our single-source-of-truth environment,” Don Kotchman, vice president of General Dynamics Land Systems U.S. Operations, said in a statement. “Our best-in-class industry team is focused on early implementation of the transformative technologies required to deliver a platform that provides an immediate leap forward in capability, with the growth margins and modular open architecture necessary to accommodate and rapidly incorporate changes to integrate new capabilities without major redesign.”
BAE Systems and General Dynamics are now the second and third prime contractors to publicly state plans to compete for OMFV, with Germany’s Rheinmetall originally announcing its intent to offer its Lynx fighting vehicle platform for the program back in October.
On Wednesday, L3Harris Technologies [LHX] announced it had joined Rheinmetall’s OMFV team which already included a roster of Textron Systems [TXT] and Raytheon Technologies [RTX].
In June 2019, prior to the cancellation of original OMFV effort, BAE Systems said it would not participate after determining the program’s requirements and acquisition schedule didn’t align with the company’s development priorities (Defense Daily, June 10, 2019).
BAE Systems had previously said its CV90 Mark IV platform could serve as a potential OMFV offering, and the company brought the vehicle to the 2018 Association of the United States Army conference in D.C.
General Dynamics had offered a purpose-built platform for the Army’s original OMFV effort, which included a new chassis, a 50mm gun, an integrated active protection system and capacity for third-generation FLIR sensors (Defense Daily, Oct. 17 2019).
The Army will award up to five contracts for OMFV digital designs in June, which will be graded on their conceptual approach and capability to meet nine flexible characteristics as well as the ability to incorporate modular open systems architecture into their proposals.