X-Bow's Navy booster deal funds tooling for up to 500 rocket motors a year

X-Bow Systems announced Monday, Oct. 12, that Leidos has selected it to develop and produce the booster motors for Leidos' Low-Cost Containerized Munition (LCCM), which X-Bow calls the Army's low-cost cruise missile.¹ X-Bow expects full-rate production of the motors at scale in 2027, the year Leidos says LCCM production begins. That puts the booster on the same clock as the missile.^1–2

Leidos is funding LCCM development itself, building on technologies from its AGM-190A Small Cruise Missile program. It said in May that warfighters will receive an initial 3,000 through a framework agreement with the Department of War. To produce the LCCM, it will expand its workforce and enhance its facilities in Huntsville, Ala., and McEwen, Tenn.²

Leidos' booster work goes to a solid rocket motor maker in a sector that, the Pentagon said in February 2022, consolidation had left with only two domestic suppliers.^{1, 4} On Oct. 7, X-Bow announced a prototype agreement to develop and qualify a solid rocket motor booster for a Navy next-generation weapon. X-Bow puts that agreement's total potential value at $69.7 million, with $50 million obligated at award.³

The Missile Defense Agency awarded Raytheon a noncompetitive, multiyear contract on Oct. 7 to manufacture and assemble Standard Missile-3 Block IB interceptors, with a total value of $6.3 billion including options.² RTX says the award is part of Raytheon's recent agreements with the Department of War and supports urgent replenishment of an interceptor first used in combat in 2024.³

That link runs back to February. Breaking Defense reported that the department and Raytheon signed a framework agreement in February designed to pave the way for this multiyear deal, and that under the agreements Raytheon would accelerate SM-3 IB production.^4–5 RTX said at the time that the agreements would span up to seven years once contracts were finalized, according to Breaking Defense.⁵ With both option years, this contract's five-plus-two-year span reaches that outer bound.¹

The department's case for the contract runs through the suppliers beneath Raytheon. It says the deal forces capital allocation "directly into assembly lines, solid-rocket motor suppliers, and critical domestic sub-tier vendors." Michael Duffey, the Under Secretary of War for Acquisition and Sustainment, said it "breaks sub-tier manufacturing bottlenecks."¹

As an undefinitized contract action, the award authorizes Raytheon to begin work immediately in Tucson, Ariz., and Huntsville, Ala.¹ Neither the department's announcements nor Raytheon's said how many missiles the contract buys.^1–3