Lockheed, Northrop, Australian Firm To Vie For USAF Ground-based Radar

Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and the Australian firm CEA Technologies will compete for a long-awaited, ground-based surveillance radar to replace the aging TPS-75, the U.S. Air Force announced on May 11.

The Air Force also announced that the Three-Dimensional Expeditionary Long-Range Radar (3DLRR) could reach initial operational status by late fiscal 2024, or three to four years earlier than scheduled under a development contract with Raytheon that was canceled late last year. 

“Our air control squadrons need this important capability, and this strategy will accelerate delivering it to them,” said Col. Michael Harm, the Air Force’s senior materiel leader for 3DELRR. 

The Air Force started searching in 2008 for a replacement of the Vietnam-era TPS-75, which is operated by the 729th Air Control Squadron at Hill AFB, Utah. A series of protests filed by Lockheed and Northrop stretched out the acquisition process until 2017, when the Air Force finally awarded an engineering and manufacturing development contract to Raytheon. 

But the acquisition delay had taken its toll on the state of Raytheon’s technology. By late 2019, the Air Force had concluded that more advanced radar systems already existed, and they could be delivered years before the scheduled 2029 timeline under Raytheon’s contract. 

The Air Force finally announced the cancellation of the Raytheon contract in early January and launched a new demonstration process called “Speed Dealer.” By using an Other Transaction Agreement process, the Air Force believed it could by the end of this year stage a demonstration with multiple candidate radars, assess the results and award a contract. The outbreak of the novel coronavirus pandemic delayed the selection of the Speed Dealer candidates by about a month, according to the Air Force, but the overall schedule remains in tact. 

Speed Dealer will give the Air Force a chance to assess the latest technology from two U.S. primes under the OTA process. CEA, the Australian firm, will perform a demonstration through a Foreign Comparative Test project award. 

CEA might be a newcomer to the U.S. military acquisition system, but not to the military radar market. The 37-year-old, Canberra-based company fielded the CEAFAR active phased array radar on the Royal Australian Navy’s Anzac-class frigates a decade ago. 

Lockheed, meanwhile, has deep experience with Air Force ground-based radars, including the fixed FPS-117 radar, which provides long-range surveillance on the Distant Early Warning line stretching across northern Alaska and Canada, and the mobile TPS-77. Lockheed has also unveiled the TPY-X ground-based, long-range 3D radar for the 3DELRR competition. 

Northrop has fielded the TPS-80 Ground/Air Task-Oriented Radar (G/ATOR) radar for the Marine Corps and unveiled the modular Vanguard radar system last year.