Army awards $1.25B wearable battery development contract

The Army has awarded four companies positions on a potential nine-year, $1.25 billion contract to help further develop a lightweight wearable battery for soldiers in the field.

Bren-Tronics, Inventus Power, Navitas Systems‘ government solutions group and Ultralife Corp. were the lone bidders to participate in the Conformal Wearable Battery program. They will compete for orders through May 2030, the Pentagon said in its Wednesday awards digest.

Also known as CWB, the battery is intended to be integrated seamlessly onto a soldier’s body armor for either the side or chest/back pouches with ballistic protective plates that are essentially invisible and transparent.

The lithium-ion rechargeable battery will also have 150 watt hours of power and be built to provide continuous power generation for up to 24 hours at a time.

Other specifications for CWS include its weight at 2.6 pounds, dimensions of 8.7-by-7.66-by 0.7 inches and an operating range of negative 4-to-140 degrees.