Lockheed Martin’s Joint Air-to-Ground Missile (JAGM) system has successfully passed its defence acquisition board review and achieved milestone C.
With the achievement, the company has received approval for the system to enter into low-rate initial production (LRIP).
The flight tests conducted on the missile system included ten limited user test flights and were completed across the performance envelope and target requirements over a period of months, thereby leading to the attainment of the milestone C status.
The test results demonstrated the combat effectiveness and technical maturity of the JAGM system.
Replacing the combat-proven Hellfire Romeo and Hellfire Longbow missiles, JAGM is a multi-sensor air-to-ground missile that is backward compatible with all rotary wing and fixed wing platforms that are capable of firing the Hellfire family of missiles.
Lockheed’s JAGM system features a multimode guidance section that provides the soldiers with improved performance capabilities on the battlefield.
The multimode seeker combines enhanced semi-active laser and millimetre wave radar sensors, which offer precision strike and fire-and-forget capability against stationary and moving land and maritime targets in adverse weather and challenging battlefield conditions.
The company received a 24-month contract from the US Army and the US Navy for the engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) phase of the programme.
The programme included the production of the JAGM missiles, in addition to their test qualification and integration on the AH-64E Apache and AH-1Z Viper attack helicopters.
The EMD phase established an initial low-rate manufacturing capability in support of three follow-on LRIP options, with their US Army initial operational capability (IOC) expected early next year.