A partnership between Raytheon’s Missiles & Defense division and Northrop Grumman has been awarded a nearly $1 billion contract to develop the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) for the U.S. Air Force.
The air-launched HACM will be the first of its kind, and the $985.34 million contract calls for the two companies to design, develop and deliver the missile by March 2027. The project is part of a joint initiative between the U.S. and Australia called the Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment, or SCIFiRE.
Both companies are major defense contractors in Arizona, with Raytheon Technologies’ (NYSE: RTX) Missiles & Defense division based in Tucson — where the company employed 13,000 people at last count and where work will be done — and Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC) having a significant presence with 3,500 employees in Chandler.
The two companies have already been working jointly since 2019 on a hypersonic weapon concept that integrates Northrop Grumman’s scramjet engines into Raytheon’s air-breathing hypersonic weapons, launching test flights in September 2021 and in July.
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