The U.S. Air Force Life Cycle Management Center at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio has awarded Boeing [BA] a $471 million contract under Japan’s Super Intereceptor program “for the design and development of an integrated suite of aircraft systems to support modification of the Japan Air Self Defense Force F-15MJ aircraft and the development, test, and delivery of four Weapon System Trainers,” DoD said in a Dec. 30 contract announcement.
Boeing is to perform the contract work through 2028 in St. Louis. Under a licensing agreement, Mitsubishi builds the Japanese versions of the Boeing F-15.
In 2019, the State Department approved a $4.5 billion deal with Japan to upgrade up to 98 of the fighters to the Japanese Super Interceptor (JSI) configuration (Defense Daily, Oct. 29, 2019). The upgrades are to improve Japan’s air-to-air defense of the country.
The JSI configuration would include the sale of up to 103 Raytheon Technologies [RTX] APG-82(v)1 Active Electronically Scanned Array radars, 116 Honeywell [HON] Advanced Display Core Processor II mission system computers and 101 BAE Systems ALQ-239 Digital Electronic Warfare Systems.
The upgrades for Japan’s F-15s could also include Selective Availability Anti-spoofing Modules (SAASM), Collins Aerospace [RTX] ARC-210 radios, and Joint Mission Planning Systems.