Army to solicit vendors for self-propelled howitzer competition by end of the month

The Army revealed today it will be inviting industry to join its fiscal year 2026 self-propelled howitzer competition by the end of February, according to a notice posted this afternoon.

The solicitation will be uploaded “on or about” Feb. 27, the notice says, and it will be for firm-fixed-price contracts related to wheeled or tracked 155mm self-propelled howitzer systems.

This marks the next step of the Army’s Self-Propelled Howitzer Modernization program: The “get to test” phase, as Ashley John, a spokesperson for Ground Combat Systems, coined it in an email to Inside Defense Jan. 31.

The phase will involve “further testing of mature platforms, and it will not be a vendor downselect,” John said. “Competition in this phase remains critical.”

The goal is to award contracts in the fourth quarter of FY-25, with the competitive evaluation at Yuma Proving Ground, AZ, planned for FY-26, John said. That will then kick off downselects in early FY-27, the second phase of the “two-phase competitive strategy.”

The upcoming solicitation will be informed by the Army’s monthslong “road show,” which spanned this past November to December, where the service handed out contracts to five vendors for a series of demos across the globe in search of readily available systems.

Cancellation of the Army’s Extended Range Cannon Artillery program, designed to boost 155mm self-propelled howitzer range from 30 to 70 kilometers, in October 2023 catalyzed the service’s pivot toward off-the-shelf technologies.

That range boost is still an Army requirement, John said in December. But in the meantime, the service needs to find a “non-developmental” system “that will provide parity with near-peer competitors while still pursuing its long-range goals.”

The upcoming solicitation will close “on or around” April 14, the Feb. 12 notice says.