Oshkosh Defense remains committed to competing for the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle follow-on contract, even after the Army acknowledged it plans to purchase fewer vehicles than previously expected, according to a company executive.
“We’re the incumbent, I still think we’re in the best position to win,” George Mansfield, vice president and general manager for joint programs at Oshkosh Defense, told Inside Defense in an Oct. 13 interview at the annual Association of the United States Army conference.
The Army plans to award a follow-on contract in fiscal year 2022 to a single company to produce the JLTV over the next decade. The contract is expected to include five guaranteed years, followed by five one-year options.
Last month, the Army announced the follow-on contract would include about 16,600 vehicles and 10,000 trailers over 10 years. This is a reduction from the 30,000 vehicles and 10,000 trailers figure the service announced last December.
AM General, which built the humvee that the JLTV will partially replace, told Inside Defense at the AUSA conference that it will also compete for the follow-on contract.
The president of GM Defense, which had emerged as a competitor for the JLTV follow-on contract, said this month the Army’s plans to purchase fewer vehicles “changes the business case a bit.” The company, a subsidiary of General Motors, has not confirmed since then that it plans to bid as a prime contractor for the follow-on contract.
This year’s House Appropriations defense subcommittee report accompanying the FY-22 spending bill asked the Army to consider a dual-source contract or other alternatives that would support a more competitive tactical wheeled vehicle industrial base.
But a service official told Inside Defense that future funding for the JLTV would probably not be enough to support two separate production lines. The plan remains for the Army to select a single competitor to build the vehicle.
Reductions to the JLTV follow-on contract did not shock Oshkosh, Mansfield said. Budget documents had indicated the military would purchase fewer JLTVs over the next few years than the earlier contract numbers suggested.
“They just got it back down to what is realistic, so they told industry what those numbers really are, that’s why it’s much lower,” Mansfield said. “This is more of what they think reality will be.”
Last month’s announcement was the second reduction to the JLTV follow-on this year, he said. In May, the Army told Oshkosh that the contract would likely include 26,350 vehicles and 9,000 trailers.
Oshkosh has already built more than 13,500 JLTVs since it won the original competition in 2015, and the follow-on contract would force the company to produce fewer JLTVs than it currently does, Mansfield said. The company’s production capacity is flexible, so it could handle cuts or increases to the program.
It is not clear yet whether cuts to the JLTV program would lead to layoffs at the Oshkosh production line, he said.
“We would have to look at that,” Mansfield said.
Oshkosh is looking into a notice the Army posted in August seeking prototypes of hybrid-electric JLTVs and humvees, he said.
“Oshkosh Corporation is into electric,” Mansfield said. “We know how to do hybrid.”
The company’s original submission for the JLTV program, more than a decade ago, used a hybrid powertrain, he said. He did not work on the program at the time, and he did not know why the hybrid plans were shelved.
The next draft request for proposals for the JLTV follow-on will be released at the end of October, Michael Sprang, project manager in the Joint Program Office for Joint Light Tactical Vehicles, told Inside Defense at the AUSA conference. It will likely be the final draft before the Army releases the official RFP.