Competition is heating up to win a contract for a vehicle that will replace nearly 18,500 aging military Humvees for the U.S. Army and Marine Corps starting in 2015.
Six
proposals are in play, with little time left before federal contracting
officials decide on development of the $5 billion-plus program.
Suppliers are lining up for an opportunity to be part of the production
teams with various contractors.
Up to three winners in the
current round could receive up to $65 million for the preproduction
engineering, manufacturing and development phase of the Joint Light
Tactical Vehicle.
Last month, AM General LLC unveiled its Blast-Resistant Vehicle-Off Road, or BRV-O, in suburban Detroit.
Here
are the other competitors vying for a maximum of three awards that the
contractors expect by early July from the U.S. Army Tacom Life Cycle
Command:
• Eagle: General Tactical Vehicles, a joint venture of AM General and General Dynamics Land Systems.
• L-ATV: Oshkosh Defense.
• Lockheed JLTV: Lockheed Martin Corp.
• Saratoga: Navistar Defense, with a separate division of BAE Systems.
• Valanx: BAE Systems Inc., with Northrop Grumman Corp. and Meritor Defense.
"The
companies are putting a lot of money into the JLTV now, even though the
money they have available is a bit tighter. There's less funding
available overall for r&d and new vehicle development," said Bruce
Barron, CEO of precision cast-maker Barron Industries Inc., of Oxford
Township, Mich.
Barron said Barron Industries has been
involved in development work on both the BRV-O for AM General and the
Eagle for General Tactical Vehicles.
But he said the
company is preparing or has submitted bids to all six project teams on
the JLTV and hopes to secure production work on components of the
chassis, suspension systems, engine and the internal housing chassis for
the electronic systems.
The next phase of contract awards
calls for vendors to submit prototypes for military testing. Here's a
summary of the six competitors:
BRV-O
AM General showed the BRV-O -- a latecomer to the competition --
publicly for the first time in the Detroit area last month. Its
six-cylinder, 3.2-liter turbocharged engine is rated at 300 hp and 500
pounds-feet of torque.
AM General has produced the original Humvee for the military since the mid-1980s.
GKN
Land Systems, a British company with offices in suburban Detroit, has
been a drivetrain components supplier to the Humvee, and some of its
components are also included on the BRV-O.
Eagle
General Dynamics Land Systems and AM General together are offering a
repurposed version of the Eagle IV, which General Dynamics European Land
Systems has supplied to the German military since at least 2008, said
Don Howe, senior director of the joint venture General Tactical
Vehicles.
The move is in part a response to the Army's
recent request to review vehicles with more "mature" technologies that
will take less time to bring to market, Howe said.
"We had
to canvass our inventory of vehicles in the AM General and General
Dynamics family and decide if between them we had a dog in the hunt. In
fact, we did, and when we ran all the calculations, we could even adapt
it and beat the $260,000 unit" price, Howe said.
L-ATV
A vehicle that Oshkosh Defense developed on its own, the Light Combat
Tactical All-Terrain Vehicle will use Oshkosh's Tak-4i intelligent
suspension system that is already in use on more than 20,000 vehicles.
The
company is also offering an optional Oshkosh ProPulse diesel-electric
hybrid powertrain to help improve fuel economy on its version of the
JLTV.
Lockheed JLTV
The Bethesda, Md., company is leading a team that includes Meritor
Defense in suburban Detroit; L-3 Combat Propulsion Systems of Muskegon,
Mich.; and Vehma International of America Inc. in suburban Detroit.
Lockheed,
a winning bidder on the first phase of JLTV development, had to make
several modifications after the Pentagon's requirements changed for the
second phase. Lockheed said it incorporated less expensive materials and
fewer exotic metals such as titanium.
Saratoga
Navistar Defense felt its Saratoga was a natural fit for the JLTV
after the Army reopened the competition to all bidders at the second
phase.
"It was something we developed on our own, to be
optimized to serve as an adaptable light tactical vehicle design of any
sort," said company communications manager Elissa Koc.
Navistar
Defense, a business unit of Navistar International Corp. of
Warrenville, Ill., has more than 250 employees in suburban Detroit who
are expected to handle engineering and preproduction work on the
Saratoga, and also handle system technical support contract work on
existing military vehicles.
Valanx
The BAE Systems vehicle has evolved since the initial round of
predevelopment contracts on the vehicle that lapsed last May, said
Deepak Bazaz, BAE's program manager on the vehicle.
The BAE
team has abandoned a previous Navi- star engine in favor of a proposed
PowerStroke 6.7- liter turbocharged diesel engine from Ford Motor Co.
The company also has brought in Roush Enterprises Inc. of suburban
Detroit to handle some engine system integration work, and has retooled
the vehicle design to meet reduced weight limits that the military has
imposed to allow for various equipment additions, Bazaz said.
A
separate division of BAE also is collaborating on Lockheed Martin
Corp.'s proposal for the vehicle, but Bazaz said the company has
procedures in place to ensure engineers and specialists on each project
do not overlap or share information.
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