TLVS JV expecting German MEADS contract in 2020

The Tactical Air Defence System (Taktische Luftverteidigungssystem: TLVS) joint venture (JV) of Lockheed Martin and MBDA expects the German government to award the long-awaited contract for its Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS) in the second-half of next year.

A model of one of the constituent components of the TLVS system being offered for Germany's MEADS programme, displayed at the Berlin Security Conference 2019. (IHS Markit/ Gareth Jennings )

Speaking to Jane’s at the Berlin Security Conference (BSC) 2019, Lockheed Martin said that with the German customer now looking to agree its existing requirements for the TLVS ground-based air defence requirement, a contract is expected in the third quarter (Q3) of 2020.

“The TLVS programme is very important to Germany, and we are now looking towards a development contract being awarded in Q3 2020,” Country Director for Germany International Business Development for Lockheed Martin, Alexander Walford, said. The final bid was submitted to Berlin earlier this year, but Walford declined to divulge details to Jane’s for commercial confidentiality reasons.

As previously reported by Jane’s , Lockheed Martin and MBDA have been working on MEADS since the early 2000s. However, the programme itself is much older than that, dating back to the early 1990s as a means to replace the Lockheed Martin/Raytheon MIM-104 Patriot system in the US, the HAWK in Germany, and the NIKE in Italy.

MEADS is designed to provide a 360° homeland and battlefield intercept capability against airborne threats, including tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles, and aircraft. A typical system comprises the Patriot Advanced 3 (PAC-3) MSE interceptor missile, the MEADS surveillance radar, the MEADS X-Band multifunctional fire-control radar (MFCR), the MEADS launcher, and a tactical operations centre. As noted in