Raytheon lands contract to build and maintain Navy Phalanx weapons

The U.S. Navy awarded Raytheon Co. of Tucson, Arizona a $159.9 million contract to manufacture and maintain the Phalanx Close-in Weapon Systems (CIWS), which provide a vital last line of defense for Navy ships.

The CIWS acts as something of a robotic gatling gun that tracks and engages enemy targets using high-tech radar configurations. More than 890 of the CIWS platforms have been built and deployed around the world.

As part of the contract, Raytheon will be providing support equipment for the Phalanx and SeaRAM Weapon Systems as well as radar upgrades. The defense contractor will also supply kits to upgrade the weapon systems’ reliability, ease of maintenance, and availability. Raytheon will also overhaul four land-based Phalanx Weapon Systems.

"Phalanx provides the U.S. Navy's ships with a 'last-chance' defense against anti-ship missiles and littoral warfare threats while SeaRAM extends that inner-layer battlespace," Rick Nelson, VP for Raytheon's Naval and Area Mission Defense sector said. "Close-in systems give warfighters the ability to automatically carry out functions usually performed by separate systems on other ships."

Work on the contract has already begun and is slated to be completed by August of 2018. Production and maintenance on the CIWS weapons will go on at Raytheon’s facility in Louisville, Kentucky.