Northrop Grumman [NOC] beat out BAE Systems on Friday for the Army’s Counter Infrared Countermeasure (CIRCM) program contract.
The Army awarded Northrop Grumman a $35 million cost-plus-fixed-fee, fixed-price incentive and firm-fixed-price hybrid contract with options for engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) and low-rate initial production (LRIP), according to a Defense Department statement. CIRCM is a modular laser-based aircraft protection system designed to protect United States rotary- and fixed-wing aircraft from infrared (IR) guided missiles.
Photo: Northrop Grumman
Work under the CIRCM contract has an estimated completion date of Oct. 28, 2017. The Army received two bids for CIRCM, DoD said.
The Army’s current missile warning system is BAE’s Common Missile Warning System (CMWS), which is responsible for detecting and declaring an infrared threat. Northrop Grumman’s CIRCM offering uses a compact Eclipse pointer/tracker, a lightweight commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) processor and an advanced Quantum Cascade Laser (QCL) technology for greater reliability and scalability. It is also built upon open architecture to work with existing hardware, simplify upgrades and keep lifecycle costs low (Defense Daily, Nov. 17).