Raytheon shows US Army the future of missile defence
Raytheon has given the US Army a look into the future of missile defence technology, as the company provided its comprehensive vision for the next generation of air and missile defence radar. The information was supplied to the Army as part of its process to define the requirements for a future Lower Tier Air and Missile Defence Sensor (LTAMDS).
"Raytheon's solution for the LTAMDS is based on the more than $200 million that the company has invested in GaN powered Active Electronically Scanned Array technology," said Ralph Acaba, vice president of Integrated Air and Missile Defence at Raytheon's Integrated Defence Systems business.
"Raytheon showed it can quickly and affordably design, build, test and field a GaN-based AESA radar capable of defeating all threats when we exhibited a potential LTAMDS solution at the winter AUSA tradeshow this past March."
Raytheon's GaN-based AESA LTAMDS radar is designed to serve as a sensor on the Integrated Air and Missile Defence Battle Command System network. It will be fully interoperable with NATO, and also retains backwards compatibility with both the current Patriot system and any future system upgrades fielded by any of the 13-nations that currently own Patriot.
"Others may draw on lesson learned from the terminated MEADS air and missile defense project or repeatedly re-baselined naval radars; Raytheon's LTAMDS solution builds on successful programs such as the US Navy's Next Generation Jammer and the Air and Missile Defence Radar," said Doug Burgess, director of Integrated Air and Missile defense AESA programs.
"Our response, and our AESA GaN radar rollout at AUSA show there doesn't need to be a wait of a decade or longer to get the sensor of the future. It will be available much, much sooner."
