The Navy awarded Boeing [BA] a $657 million modification to the MQ-25 contract on March 29 to add production and delivery of two more system demonstration test aircraft (SDTA).
This follows an $85 million
modification for three system demonstration test aircraft awarded in 2020 (Defense Daily, April 3, 2020).
The MQ-25 Stingray is the future carrier-based unmanned tanker. It aims to replace F/A-18E/F Super Hornets currently designated in refueling roles, so more aircraft will be freed up for combat use.
The latest mod covers vehicles four and five and also includes definitizing “obsolescence phase two for non-recurring engineering to address product baseline obsolescence to support low-rate initial production for the MQ-25 Stingray program.”
The work will be split between St. Louis (45.43 percent) and various locations, mostly in the U.S., and is expected to be finished by October 2028.
According to the Navy’s fiscal year 2025 budget request documents, the MQ-25 program of record covers 76 total vehicles, starting with four as engineering development models and five SDTAs. Both of these initial types are being incrementally funded using research and development funds. The other 67 aircraft will be funded by the regular aircraft procurement account.
However, the budget documents said the program is showing a quantity of 71 under production with the amount to be reduced by four vehicles “with the finalization of the reprogramming/restructure and the budget is updated.”
The reduction in vehicles reduced one in FY ‘23 and three in FY ‘24.
Previously, last year a DoD Office of the Inspector General report said the Navy was pushing back the MQ-25 schedule due to production maturity issues and to conduct enough testing before moving on to more production (Defense Daily, Nov. 27, 2023).
As of that report, the Navy said it did not plan for Milestone C and the low-rate initial production (LRIP) contract decisions to occur in 2023, moving MQ-25 toward a more traditional acquisition strategy.
The latest budget request documents said the MQ-25 program currently plans for initial test and evaluation of the platform to last from the third quarter of FY ‘24 to the fourth quarter of FY ‘27, initial operational test and evaluation in the first half of FY ‘27, and initial operational capability in the fourth quarter of FY 2026.
It also confirmed in June 2023 the Secretary of the Navy approved a program path that delayed the Milestone-C decision to the third quarter of FY ‘25. Programming restructuring between the aircraft procurement and research and development accounts in FY ‘23 and ‘24 are being used to fund critical obsolescence redesign efforts and procurement of these two more SDTAs.
This means the Navy plans to also award the LRIP contract in June 2025.
The Navy said congressional committees approved and executed reprogramming for FY ‘23 and budgets will be updated for FY ‘24 once the budget is finalized.
The FY ‘25 budget seeks about $502 million for three LRIP aircraft, plus $51 million in advanced procurement funds for three more future LRIP vehicles.