Here are the programs that made the biggest news over the past week:
GAO piles on LCS — Just when things had begun to quiet down on the LCS program, the Government Accountability Office cast doubt on the program in a new report to Congress last week, said the Navy didn’t collect enough data from the ship’s first deployment to Singapore last year,
we reported. Because the USS Freedom (LCS-1) was sidelined by mechanical problems at times, the Navy didn’t yield as many lessons learned from the experience as it had hoped, and the service hasn’t yet had the opportunity to collect data for its three mission packages because they’re still in development, GAO stated. In addition, the report states that the LCS could cost more to operate than other more capable ships — up to $79 million annually, which would exceed that of a DDG-51 destroyer. Read more LCS analysis >>>
All JLTV offerings now net-ready — The JLTV reached a major milestone last week with Oshkosh Defense announcing it had completed net-ready testing for its offering, and competitors Lockheed Martin and AM General having said they have done the same, we reported. A key part of the JLTV program will be to prove that the vehicle can satisfy its technical requirements for the transition to net-centric military operations. The Pentagon announced plans to begin buying the vehicle for the first time this year in fiscal 2015 budget request, asking for 176 Army vehicles and seven Marine Corps vehicles. Read more JLTV analysis >>>
Raytheon moves forward with FAB-T — FAB-T contract winner Raytheon isn’t wasting any time getting to work on the program after defeating Boeing for the $298 million deal last month, we reported. Raytheon has finished the design and manufacturing of the low-rate initial production (LRIP) configuration of FAB-T command post terminals. Airborne testing will begin within the next month, and the company is scheduled to deliver a terminal to be installed on a test aircraft and a ground terminal to permit communication between the two. The Air Force is buying 84 systems in all, although LRIP quantities haven’t been finalized. Read more FAB-T analysis >>>
F-35 to miss Farnborough? — The F-35 grounding stretched into yet another week, and it means that the F-35B the program had hoped to send to the Farnborough International Air Show taking place this week won’t make it on time, if at all, we reported. While the grounding, which has stretched to 16 days for the Air Force variant, isn’t likely to cause a significant development setback for the aircraft, the program had hoped to display the F-35B at the annual air show as it seeks to maintain international support for the aircraft. (Update 1: The F-35 has been cleared to fly, but its Farnborough status remains unknown. Update 2: The Pentagon announced July 15 that the F-35B would not make the trip to Farnborough.) Read more F-35 analysis >>>