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Raytheon Missile Systems has secured a US$768 million ($1.1 billion) non-competitive fixed-price incentive (firm) contract for Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) Production Lot 33, and includes foreign military sales to the Royal Australian Air Force.
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This contract provides for the production of the AMRAAM missiles, captive air training missiles, guidance sections, AMRAAM telemetry system, spares and other production engineering support hardware.
Work will be performed in Tucson, Arizona, with an expected completion date of 28 February 2023.
This contract involves unclassified foreign military sales to Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Indonesia, Japan, Kuwait, Morocco, the Netherlands, Norway, Oman, Poland, Qatar, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, Turkey and the UK, which accounts for 47 per cent of the contract value. The Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Air Dominance Division Contracting Office, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, is the contracting activity.
The AMRAAM is a sophisticated air dominance weapon, developed over more than 25 years of design, upgrades, testing and production.
AMRAAM's capabilities have been fully demonstrated in more than 4,200 test shots and 10 air-to-air combat victories. The AMRAAM missile is a versatile and proven weapon with operational flexibility in a wide variety of scenarios, including air-to-air and surface-launch engagements.
In the air-to-air role, the weapon's advanced active guidance section provides aircrew with a high degree of combat flexibility and lethality. Its mature seeker design allows it to quickly find targets in the most combat challenging environments.
As an FMS customer of the AMRAAM, Australia will benefit from the contract modification. The Royal Australian Air Force currently integrates the AIM-120 AMRAAM into its Classic Hornet, Super Hornet and future F-35A fleets, which will leverage the open system's networked capability and proven design of the AMRAAM system.
The AMRAAM system in particular will serve as the primary air-to-air missile system for the RAAF's fleet of F-35s. Raytheon is providing a range of state-of-the-art weapons systems to Australia's F-35 fleet, which will see the aircraft dominate the air, ground and sea domain.
"The current weapon systems provided by Raytheon for the F-35A platform include the Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile, which is currently the only radar guided air-to-air missile that is cleared to fly on the F-35A," a Raytheon spokesperson told Defence Connect in 2018.
Raytheon Company, with 2018 sales of $27 billion and 67,000 employees, is a technology and innovation leader specialising in defence, civil government and cyber security solutions.
With a history of innovation spanning 97 years, Raytheon provides state-of-the-art electronics, mission systems integration, C5I products and services, sensing, effects and mission support for customers in more than 80 countries. Raytheon is headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts.
