The U.S. Army today awarded a Lockheed Martin team an $879 million defense contract to develop the Aerial Common Sensor (ACS), a next generation airborne intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR) and target identification system.

ACS will replace current ISR aircraft, including the Army's Guardrail Common Sensor, the Airborne Reconnaissance Low aircraft and the Navy's fleet of E-P3 aircraft. Under the System Development and Demonstration (SDD) contract awarded today, the Lockheed Martin team will combine and enhance the capabilities of the current systems on these platforms into a single ISR mission package on an Embraer ERJ-145 platform. The contract has a potential value of over $7 billion over the life of the expected 20-year program.

"We are extremely proud to partner with the U. S. government in the development of ACS," said Stan Sloane, Lockheed Martin Executive Vice President for the Integrated Systems & Solutions business area. "With ACS warfighters can see and act first with greater speed and accuracy. Our team will deliver a highly sophisticated system that will help enable net-centric operations and provide a tactical overwatch for the future force."

Specifically, under the SDD phase of the contract the team will deliver five certified, mission ready airborne ISR systems, with initial testing planned for 2006. The balance of the effort would be performed under a follow-on low rate initial production contract anticipated in 2007, followed by a full rate production contract in 2009.

Lockheed Martin's ACS design features an unprecedented sensor-computer integration that will pinpoint threats in real-time. ACS will provide instantaneous access to decision-quality intelligence from manned, unmanned and space-based ISR systems. It will provide U.S. Army and U.S. Navy commanders with persistent surveillance, allowing them to "see" a complete representation of the battlespace.

The team's ACS solution incorporates a software-centric, open architecture to ensure easy technology insertion, growth and compatibility with future systems including the Army's Future Combat System and the Distributed Common Ground System (DCGS). ACS will bring real-time multi-intelligence sensor and fusion capability to DCGS and will use the new DCGS architecture framework to enable extended joint operations with ISR systems such as JSTARS, U-2, and Global Hawk.

The ACS sensor suite will fly onboard a militarized Embraer ERJ-145 aircraft. This platform is well suited to the demanding, high duty cycle environment for ACS, and as a commercial platform offers a worldwide support infrastructure and low life cycle costs. In addition to Embraer, Lockheed Martin's team includes Argon Engineering, BAE Systems, General Dynamics, Harris, L-3 Communications and Raytheon.

The acquisition authority for ACS is the Army's PEO, Intelligence, Electronic Warfare & Sensors office, Fort Monmouth, New Jersey.

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin employs about 130,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture and integration of advanced technology systems, products and services. The corporation reported 2003 sales of $31.8 billion.

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SOURCE: Lockheed Martin