Lockheed Martin Delivers 100th SEWIP 2, Starts Deliveries of SEWIP Lite to Navy

Lockheed Martin is now delivering the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) Lite as SWEIP Block 2 deliveries reach 100. *LOCKHEED MARTIN*

ARLINGTON, Va. — Lockheed Martin’s deliveries of electronic warfare capabilities to U.S. Navy now include Surface Warfare Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) Lite as deliveries of (SEWIP) Block 2 reaches 100, a company official said.

SEWIP Lite is a scaled version of SEWIP Block 2 designed for installation on smaller warships such as the Navy’s littoral combat ships (LCSs) and the Coast Guard’s new offshore patrol cutters now under construction. SEWIP Lite operates with the same hardware software and same inboard processing as SEWIP Block 2.

“SEWIP Lite now is in production” said Joe Ottaviano, director for Maritime and Air Cyber/Electronic Warfare at Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems, in an interview with Seapower. “We’ve delivered several of those already. Some are on the way for installation on LCS.”

Ottaviano said that some international customers have expressed an interest in SEWIP Lite, designed for ships smaller than an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer which have size, weight, and space limitations. Block 2 currently is planned for the Constellation-class frigate.

The SLQ-32(V)6 SEWIP Block 2, including SEWIP Lite, is being installed on all active U.S. Navy surface combatants. Block 2 is in its second five-year full-rate production run.

“We’re going through tech refresh now,” Ottaviano said. “A lot of the open-architecture things we had put in place over the years is allowing us to tech refresh SEWIP, our submarine programs, our airborne programs at a pretty rapid pace, every couple of years without causing a huge development cycle.”

Lockheed Martin is continuing to work with the Navy as they integrate the [electronic attack] Block 3 portion into [SEWIP]. Block 3 is a Northrop Grumman program.

“Block 2 brings the foundation of the Navy’s EW battle management — the displays, integration, the sharing of EW information across the fleet, and providing the enterprise protection,” Ottaviano said. “It actually cues Block 3 and helps drive its response.”

He said the SEWIP is now tightly integrated into the Aegis Combat System.

“Now we can do everything we need to do passively,” he said.