L-3 Communications seleced the Gulfstream 550 Conformal Airborne Early Warning (CAEW) aircraft to host the US Air Force’s existing Compass Call technology, a move that its rivals Boeing and Bombardier attempted to thwart over the past two years.
The USAF awarded an undefinitised contract action (UCA) to L-3 for the re-host programme, the service announced this week. Contract terms, specifications and price of the UCA are not agreed upon before contract performance begins, a USAF spokeswoman said in an email.
The Compass Call “crossdeck” programme will transition mission equipment fro the USAF’s existing fleet of Lockheed Martin EC-130H aircraft, which serves as a communications eavesdropper and jammer for the service, onto new Gulfstream business jets.
Last year, the USAF’s fiscal year 2017 budget request proposed to shift Compass Call’s electronic attack hardware to the G550 airframe. The FY17 budget had then designated the platform as the EC-37B. The USAF currently operates a fleet of G550-based C-37s for VIP transport. The US Navy also has acquired one G550 CAEW aircraft for test range support. Gulfstream also has sold the CAEW platform on the export market, with deliveries to Israel and Singapore.
“After their analysis and sharing that with the programme office, L-3 has decided to use the Gulfstream 550 airborne early warning aircraft as the new platform,” a USAF spokeswoman says in a statement.
Last month, the Government Accountability Office denied Boeing and Bombardier’s protest against the US Air Force’s acquisition strategy for Compass Call, which delegated the platform decision to systems integrator L-3. Boeing and Bombardier’s protests predicted L-3 would hand the platform award to Gulfstream, which is also teaming up with L-3 to compete for the USAF’s Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) recapitalisation. The GAO’s 25 August decision is covered by a protective order and did not include additional information.
While Boeing and Bombardier could protest the USAF’s acquisition strategy, the companies are not able to protest another contractor’s decision.
