NASHVILLE, Tenn. – As the Army moves on from the AH-64D Apache and looks to operate a fleet of entirely E-models, a Boeing [BA] official said Thursday it’s too “early” to know about a final decision on another multi-year procurement contract for the aircraft.
“Ultimately, we want to get to another multi-year contract to be able to support all the international opportunities that are coming into that. It’s probably a little early to say, yeah, that’s a guarantee going to happen with the changes in the number of aircraft,” Mark Ballew, Boeing’s senior director of business development and strategy for vertical lift, told reporters. “But we continue to deliver on our existing multi-year. We’ve got international customers coming in. And then if you talk through what that’s going to be, we’ll figure out what’s the smartest contracting process to be able to do that to give the best value to the U.S. government and our international allies.”
The Army earlier this month announced it was moving on from the AH-64D Apache as part of its new transformation initiative, which also includes cutting “obsolete” programs such as the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, Humvee, the M10 Booker combat vehicle and Gray Eagle drones and ending development of the Improved Turbine Engine Program, the Future Tactical UAS and the Robotic Combat Vehicle (Defense Daily, May 1).
“Maintaining two models of the Apaches, the Delta and the Echo complicates training, supply chains, logistics and maintenance. [As] a result of divesting Deltas, we will have enough Echos to purefleet our Army,” Gen. James Mingus, the Army vice chief of staff, said in remarks here at the Army Aviation Association of America’s annual conference on Wednesday.
Mingus told reporters after his remarks the Army has enough AH-64Es to “pure fleet” its Apache inventory with the latest model and that the Army doesn’t plan to remanufacture any more AH-64Ds to the newer E-model.
Kathleen Jolivette, Boeing’s vice president and general manager for vertical lift, said at a briefing here that work on the current multi-year Apache contract has not been impacted by the transformation initiative plans, noting the Army is “still going through the decision process” on what it will do with its AH-64Ds.
“We want to help them with those decisions. Perhaps there might be a [Foreign Military Sales] customer who would be interested in taking some D-[models] and converting them to E-[models], as one thought,” Jolivette said.
Christina Upah, Boeing’s vice president and program manager for attack helicopters, said conversations are “always happening” with the Army on the next multi-year deal for Apache.
The Army signed the second and what was at the time the expected final multi-year contract for AH-64E Apache attack helicopters with Boeing in March 2023, which will run through 2027 and could be worth up to $3.8 billion (Defense Daily, March 17 2023).
Upah told Defense Daily last April that Boeing was “confident” there will be another procurement deal for Apache, adding that details on the next multi-year award were already “in the works” (Defense Daily, April 24 2024).
Boeing has also been working on the new Version 6.5 upgrade for Apache, with Upah confirming to reporters that the final software build for the aircraft will be complete within “the next month or so.”
“Subsequent to that, we’ll do the final flight testing of that software build and receive the [Army Airworthiness Release] so the Army can determine, ultimately, when they’ll field Version 6.5,” Upah said.
Upah added Version 6.5 will bring an “open systems interface” to Apache, and that it’s “the pathway to that [Modular Open Systems Architecture] environment, getting to that plug and play.”
Plans to eventually build a Version 6.5 upgrade would not be built into the current multi-year and require a subsequent contract action, Upah noted.
Boeing has also detailed its work on a Modernized Apache concept, with Upah having previously said the company continues to work with the Army to inform design priorities and anticipates that a first flight with the future platform would likely occur in the 2030s.