Navy orders shipboard electronic warfare systems from Lockheed Martin in $153.9 million contract
WASHINGTON, 15 July 2015. U.S. Navy surface warfare experts are ordering advanced electronic warfare (EW) systems for surface warships like aircraft carriers, amphibious assault ships, cruisers, and destroyers under terms of a $153.9 million contract modification announced Friday.
Officials of the Naval Sea Systems Command in Washington are asking engineers at the Lockheed Martin Radar Systems segment in Liverpool, N.Y., to build Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) Block 2 systems for fiscal 2015.
SEWIP is an evolutionary acquisition program to upgrade the existing out-of-production AN/SLQ-32(V) EW system and provide improved anti-ship missile defense and situational awareness.
SEWIP Block 2 provides improved electronic support receivers and combat system interface and expands the receiver and antenna group to help surface electronic warfare capabilities keep pace with growing threats.
Lockheed Martin Radar Systems won a Navy award for block 2 in late 2009, leading a team of ITT Electronic Systems, Cobham Defence Electronic Systems, Research Associates Syracuse, and Azure Summit Technology of Fairfax, Va.
Since the SEWIP program started in 2002, General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems (AIS) in Fairfax, Va., acted as prime contractor for SEWIP blocks 1A, 1B1, 1B2, and 1B3.
The Lockheed Martin Block 2 SEWIP design is based on its integrated common electronics warfare system (ICEWS), which enables rapid reconfiguring of the system with commercial technology.
Mercury Systems in Chelmsford, Mass., for example, is providing advanced radio frequency (RF) microwave tuners and intermediate frequency (IF) products for SEWIP Block 2. Lockheed Martin chose the Mercury Echotek series microwave tuner and digital receiver, which are optimized for fast tuning and high performance, Mercury officials say.
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Developed by Raytheon in the 1970s, the original AN/SLQ-32 systems employed passive radar technology for early warning, identification and tracking of enemy threats. Subsequent upgrades provided an additional active capability for simultaneous jamming of several different threats.
Last February the Northrop Grumman Corp. Navigation and Maritime Systems Division in Linthicum, Md., won $267 million Navy contract to develop and build SEWIP Block 3 to make further upgrades to the AN/SLQ-32 with new technologies for early detection, signal analysis, threat warning, and protection from anti-ship missiles. There are three established SEWIP block upgrades and a fourth is planned.
On Friday's contract modification Lockheed Martin will do the work in Syracuse, N.Y; Lansdale, Pa.; and Chelmsford, Mass., and should be finished by April 2018.
For more information contact Lockheed Martin Radar Systems online at http://lockheedmartin.com, or Naval Sea Systems Command at www.navsea.navy.mil.
John Keller | Editor
John Keller is editor-in-chief of Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine, which provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronic and optoelectronic technologies in military, space, and commercial aviation applications. A member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since the magazine's founding in 1989, Mr. Keller took over as chief editor in 1995.
