Air Force puts out call to industry for new counter-air missiles
The Air Force is seeking industry’s ideas on a potential new project to develop an anti-air missile that can be rapidly produced for around $500,000 per munition.
The service recently published a presolicitation on Sam.gov requesting industry white papers for the new Counter-Air Missile Program (CAMP), which is being run by the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s Armament Directorate. The effort is still in the conceptual phases of development, but the service broadly envisions procuring thousands of weapons, including ground-launched variants.
Industry has until Dec. 2 to submit their white papers.
“The highest priority of this effort is the development and demonstration of an affordable, open system, modular, and highly producible ground-launched capability,” the solicitation stated. “Ground-launch efforts will serve as a risk reduction effort expediting missile design maturation and evaluation for future affordable air-to-air missile capabilities.”
The Air Force is specifically looking for systems that can be purchased for no more than $500,000 per all-up round, and in quantities of at least 1,000 munitions per year when the program reaches full-rate production, according to the service.
While the presolicitation does not provide details on specific performance characteristics the Air Force is interested in for the weapons, it does state that the service is willing to “trade exquisite capabilities for affordability and producibility.” The program will also prioritize modular and open systems architectures, and digital-first development methods. Contractors can request an appendix that contains controlled unclassified information and lays out CAMP system attributes.
The CAMP effort would be executed in phases, with phase 1 lasting two years and focusing on developing a ground-launched variation of the anti-air missile. Phase 2 would transition the munition into a program of record, and future phases could allow the Air Force to iterate and transform the missile into an air-to-air variant, according to the presolicitation.
At the same time, the ground-launched CAMP munition will be part of the Air Force’s Enterprise Test Vehicle (ETV) weapons class, “providing a lower cost, rapid capability to integrate and demonstrate future sub-systems and components in a relevant environment prior to integration into a Program of Record weapon.”
In partnership with the Defense Innovation Unit, the Air Force is pursuing a family of low-cost cruise missiles under the ETV program. Anduril and Zone 5 Technologies each received contracts from the service and DIU in March to continue development work under the ETV effort that focuses on developing a palletized munitions platform for the Franklin Affordable Mass Missile (FAMM) program.
