German UAV Pact Awarded

A joint venture of Northrop Grumman and EADS won a $559 million contract from the German Ministry of Defense for the development and testing the Euro Hawk unmanned signals intelligence (SIGINT) surveillance and reconnaissance system.
EuroHawk GmbH, the joint venture company, said the Euro Hawk (R) will serve as the German Air Force’s high-altitude, long-endurance (HALE) SIGINT system. The Euro Hawk has a wing span larger than a commercial airliner's and an endurance projected at up to 30 hours, the companies said. Delivery of the first demonstrator is scheduled for 2010, with the following four systems scheduled tentatively between 2011 and 2014. Under this contract, EuroHawk GmbH will also provide aircraft modifications, mission control and launch and recovery ground segments, flight test and logistics support. The Euro Hawk is a derivative of the U.S. Air Force RQ-4 Block 20 Global Hawk built by Northrop Grumman, equipped with a SIGINT mission system developed by EADS. The SIGINT system provides stand-off capability to detect electronic intelligence radar emitters and communications intelligence emitters. EADS will also provide the ground stations that will receive and analyze the data from Euro Hawk(R) as part of an integrated system solution. A joint team will conduct integration and flight test activity in Germany in late 2009. More