QUANTICO, Va. — BAE Systems has started soliciting offerings to find an unmanned weapon system for the turreted variant of the Marine Corps’ Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV), with plans to award up to three contracts to evaluate options, a company official said Tuesday.
John Swift, BAE Systems’ director of amphibious programs, told
Defense Daily at the Modern Day Marine conference here the company will test unmanned turrets in the first quarter of 2020 before choosing a final capability next summer.
“We’re looking for something that is light, something less than 3,000 pounds. We’re looking for something that is marinized that can work in a marine environment. And it has to be 30mm [caliber],” Swift said.
The turreted variant, or ACV-30, is part of the Marine Corps’ “Family of Vehicles” approach for its newest amphibious vehicle, which also includes command and control (ACV-C) and recovery (ACV-R) versions.
In June, BAE Systems announced it received a $67 million contract modification to develop the ACV-C and ACV-30 (Defense Daily, June 25).
Swift said BAE Systems is set to deliver three ACV-C platforms to Marine Corps late next summer for initial testing.
A delivery for three ACV-30 vehicles will be scheduled following the Marine Corps’ integration evaluation of the unmanned turret system late next year, according to Swift.
For the recovery variant, Swift noted the Marine Corps is still working to finalize and approve the requirements, which is at least two years away.
BAE Systems also brought an ACV testbed platform to Modern Day Marine configured as a potential long-range reconnaissance variation.
“There’s no requirement for this vehicle. It shows us being able to take advanced technologies and integrate them into a 7,000-pound payload,” Swift said. “A long-range reconnaissance variant has a crew of three, two reconnaissance stations for a gunner. You have FLIR out to 50 km. You have a drone capability out to 25 km. All that has the ability to acquire targets at that range, identify targets and if necessary destroy that target through the Spike missile.”