Three U.S. firms and Saab to chase Army simulation and training contracts

Three major systems integrators?Anteon International Corp., Lockheed Martin Corp. and Northrop Grumman Corp.?have teamed with a unit of Swedish aerospace giant Saab AB, to jointly offer solutions to meet future U.S. Army simulation and training requirements.

The new team, called the Warfighter Focus (Field Operations Customer Support) Alliance, said its members already provide the Army most of its training systems for live, virtual and constructive simulation and training.

The new alliance is intended to provide a "convenient and efficient contract vehicle for current and future U.S. Army simulation and training requirements," the alliance said in a press release today.

"Over the past few years, the Army has found it difficult to manage separate support contracts for different simulation and training systems that complement each other," said Larry Retta, senior group vice president of simulation and training at Anteon. "By working together as part of the alliance, we will be able to provide an integrated team option that is more efficient by eliminating redundancies and allowing the leading providers of live, virtual and constructive support to leverage cross-functional capabilities."

Anteon recently won a $350 million contract from the Army's Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation to design and install live training ranges and digital multipurpose battle area complexes.

The members of the alliance are Anteon of Fairfax, Va.; Lockheed Martin of Bethesda, Md.; Northrop Grumman of Los Angeles; and Saab Training Systems AB of Huskvarna, Sweden.