Lockheed Martin U.K. has been awarded a seven-year contract to provide combat system upgrades for the sonar systems aboard four Royal Navy Vanguard Class ballistic missile submarines. More than 70% of the work will be performed in the United Kingdom.

The Vanguard Class submarine's 2054 sonar suite is facing near-term obsolescence. Lockheed Martin will use the acoustic rapid commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) insertion (ARCI) business model, proven in U.S. Navy service, to provide the Royal Navy submarine force with an open-architecture system that will circumvent obsolescence issues. This move to an open architecture will make it easier for the Royal Navy to upgrade its Sonar 2054 suites as new technologies become available.

The ARCI program has been providing continuously increasing sonar capability at decreasing cost to the U.S. Navy's submarine force since 1998.

Much of the Sonar 2054 work will be performed at existing Lockheed Martin U.K. facilities, including an integration center in Havant and at the Swift Laboratory, a new demonstration and experimentation center in Farnborough, that opened in June.