The Missile Defense Agency has awarded a total of $127 million in three separate contracts to Boeing [BA], Lockheed Martin [LMT] and Raytheon [RTN] to begin conceptual design and development work on the agency’s next-generation of SM-3 missiles.
Lockheed Martin garnered the lion’s share of the $127 million, with MDA awarding the company $43.3 million for the effort. Raytheon, which is the prime contractor on the SM-3 missile, netted $42.7 million toward its work on the follow-on system, with Boeing being awarded $41.1 million for their concept development program, according to the contracts issued on April 7.
Under these contracts, each company “will work with MDA on the concept definition and program planning “toward the development of the Block IIB version of the [SM-3],” including defining and assessing “viable and affordable missile configurations” with support from trade studies, ultimately leading to an “executable development plan.”
Each company was also awarded $1.4 million in DOD research, development, test and evaluation (RDT&E) funds appropriated in the fiscal year 2011 defense spending bill to “incrementally fund this effort,” the contract notices state.
The Block 1A version of the SM-3 is currently deployed on Navy warships and is the backbone of the service’s sea-based Aegis ballistic missile defense system. Service and industry officials anticipate fielding the Block 1B variant of the weapon on a land-based version of the Aegis system in Eastern Europe.
The Block IIA and eventual Block IIB versions of the missile will be developed in a block approach, based system technologies on board the IA and IB missiles.
Both the Block IA and IB are key to the Pentagon’s European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) for missile defense, approved in September 2009 by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen, and President Obama.
However, former Missile Defense Agency (MDA) director Lt. Gen. Trey Obering said last week that problems with the Block IA system would likely find their way into the new Block IB variant of the weapon. Given the spiral approach for SM-3 development, those problems would “tend to cycle through” all current and future variants of the weapon–including the IIA and IIB versions (Defense Daily, April 6).
Currently an executive with Booz Allen Hamilton [BAH], Obering served as director of MDA from 2004-2009.
Frank Wyatt, vice president of Raytheon Air and Missile Defense Systems, dismissed Obering’s claims during an April 5 interview, noting the company has been and would continue to meet all the SM-3 development and deployment timelines set by the White House and DoD to comply with the EPAA.