Sunday, June 15, 2025
Sunday, June 15, 2025
The first operational unit of a developing passive sensing and targeting system designed by L3Harris for use on Navy surface ships is expected to be installed aboard an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer in 2027 and integrated with the vessel's Aegis Combat System, according to company executives.
L3Harris was selected by the Navy to build this system -- the Shipboard Panoramic Electro-Optic/Infrared (SPEIR) -- in 2022, receiving an initial $205 million award with a potential value of up to $593 million if all options are exercised.
The program completed its critical design review in March 2024 and is now expected to deliver a “demonstration asset” later this year to begin testing with the Navy, according to Jon Rambeau, president of integrated mission systems at L3Harris.
The passive system uses electro-optic and infrared (EO/IR) imagery sensors and is designed to complement the active radar systems already used on surface ships, Rambeau told reporters ahead of the Navy League's annual Sea-Air-Space conference.
“This is really designed to complement the active radar systems that are onboard surface ships, so that they can operate ‘lights out,’ and turn that radar off when they don't want to be exposed and identify themselves as a target, and instead use a passive system that doesn't emit any energy to be able to do long-range detection, categorization and tracking of targets,” he said.
In addition to this “lights out” application, Rambeau said SPEIR will improve upon existing systems by providing a longer-range detection capability and by using artificial intelligence to identify and classify targets.
“You may not get the range of a SPY radar, but you will get a very long-range, accurate EO/IR that will give you a visual picture of what it is out there with a fairly high resolution in many cases,” he said. “It should be able, with the AI capability, to start working through a catalog of known assets to categorize and prioritize threats.”
To date, the program has successfully completed six software build reviews and three design verification test events at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division in Indiana and at the Directed Energy Systems Integration Laboratory (DESIL) in California, an L3Harris spokesperson told Inside Defense.
L3Harris is currently procuring materials to support engineering development model unit builds in 2025 and the start of system level environmental and functional qualification testing in late 2025, the spokesperson said.