SALINA — Lockheed Martin Corp.’s (NYSE: LMT) manufacturing plant in the town of Salina has secured a U.S. Army radar contract that could be worth up to $3 billion, which would make it the facility’s largest-ever contract. Lockheed will initially receive $281 million to develop and produce the Sentinel A4 radar system at the plant located […]
SALINA — Lockheed Martin Corp.’s (NYSE: LMT) manufacturing plant in the town of Salina has secured a U.S. Army radar contract that could be worth up to $3 billion, which would make it the facility’s largest-ever contract.
Lockheed will initially receive $281 million to develop and produce the Sentinel A4 radar system at the plant located on Electronics Parkway. The Army will award additional production funding at a later date, the office of U.S. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D–N.Y.) said in a Sept. 26 news release.
The senator noted that the “potential value” of the program to Lockheed Martin amounts to “upwards of $3 billion over 20 years,” including production and “potential” international sales.
This is the second radar that Lockheed Martin’s Salina factory will produce for the Army. It already manufactures the Q-53 radar, Schumer’s office noted.
Schumer said that the contract “would maintain the Lockheed Martin Syracuse workforce for the long-term future.”
“This multi-billion dollar, record-breaking contract enables the world-class workforce at Lockheed Martin to produce cutting-edge radar that protects our troops on the battlefield and will also drive the Central New York economy for years to come,” Schumer contended in the release. “I have fought long and hard for the kind of funding and federal programs that help Lockheed Martin in Syracuse do what it does best: produce superior technology for the United States armed forces.”
The new Sentinel A4 radar will provide “improved surveillance, detection, and classification capabilities against current and emerging aerial threats,” per a Sept. 27 Lockheed Martin news release on the contract. This “needed capability” will help provide protection “for the next 40 years,” the firm added.
“By leveraging our open scalable radar architecture and production efforts, we believe we provide the lowest risk and best value solution for the U.S. Army that will help protect our warfighters for years to come,” Rob Smith, VP and general manager for Lockheed Martin’s radar and sensor systems, said. “We have fielded numerous tactical Gallium Nitride (GaN) based radars beginning with the delivery of the TPS-77 Multi Role Radar to Latvia in 2018 and we are under contract with the Army to insert GaN into the Q-53 system.”
About the Sentinel A4
The Sentinel A4 is a “high-performance” modification of the Sentinel A3 air and missile defense radar that will “update the existing Sentinel capability against cruise missiles, unmanned aerial systems, rotary wing and fixed wing threats,” Schumer’s office said.
Additionally, the Sentinel A4 will also offer new array and signal-processing components to add detection, classification, identification and reporting capability against rocket, artillery, and mortar threats.