Yahoo Finance RTX Secures a Contract to Aid Silent Knight Radar Systems
RTX Corp. RTX recently secured a contract involving its Silent Knight radar systems. The award has been provided by the U.S. Special Operations Command, MacDill Air Force, FL.
Details of the Deal
Valued at $33.7 million, the contract has a ceiling amount of $293 million and is projected to be completed by Jun 14, 2030. Per the terms of the deal, RTX will provide sustainment, support, research, development and supplemental objectives related to the Silent Knight radar systems.
By offering these aids, RTX will support the U.S. Special Operations Command Program Executive Office-Fixed Wing, Special Operations Forces Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics-KF. Work related to this deal will be carried out in McKinney, TX.
RTX & Radars
With the rapid escalation of geopolitical tensions globally in recent times, nations across the globe have been significantly boosting their defense arsenal. Since radars constitute a vital part of this arsenal, escalation in defense spending has been boosting investments in radars as well.
To this end, it is imperative to mention that while radars have been in use since World War II for locating threats and targets, they are being used today for multiple purposes like ground surveillance, missile control, fire control, moving target indication, weapons location and vehicle search.
This must have been ushering in solid order flow for radar manufacturing companies like RTX in the form of contract wins like the latest one. Notably, RTX’s Silent Knight radar serves as a common multi-mode terrain following/terrain avoidance radar for a variety of platforms including the MH-47G helicopter, the lead aircraft for the program. It allows airborne forces safe low-level flight and safe ingress and egress in adverse environments. The system also provides navigation support, ground mapping and weather information to aircrews.
RTX’s Growth Prospects
The demand for military radar systems has expanded manifold in recent times, driven by factors like the rise in defense spending of emerging economies, increase in regional tensions and inter-country conflicts that have boosted threats from missiles and aircraft.
This has set the stage for ample growth opportunities for the military radar market and must have prompted the Markets and Markets firm to project a CAGR of 4.7% during 2023-2027 for the global military radar market. Such growth projections bode well for prominent radar manufacturers like RTX.
Impressively, RTX’s product portfolio consists of varied radars like integrated air and missile defense radars, ballistic missile radars, surveillance radars as well as air dominance radars. Radars like AN-TPY-2, APG-79 and APG-82 are some of the company’s combat-proven products that enjoy solid demand in the global military radar market, apart from AN/SPY-6.
Opportunities for Peers
RTX apart, other defense contractors that are major radar manufacturers and thus expected to benefit from the growth opportunities offered by the global military radar market are discussed below:
Lockheed Martin LMT: Its radars are the choice of more than 45 nations on six continents. The company’s product portfolio includes various radar systems like AN/APY-9 radar, airborne ground surveillance radar systems, AN/TPQ-53 radar systems, SPY-7, the long-range discrimination radar, FPS-117 and a few more.
Lockheed boasts a long-term earnings growth rate of 4.10%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for its 2024 earnings implies an improvement of 3.2% from the 2023 reported figure.
L3Harris Technologies LHX: The company manufactures combat-proven radars like SPS-48, land-based surveillance radar, AN/APY-11 Multimode radar, Tactical Air Surveillance radar, AN/SPS-48G Long range 3D surveillance radar and many more. Notably, its Vigilant family of software-defined, radar electronic support measures solutions is essential for survival and dominance in the electromagnetic threat environment of the modern battlefield.
L3Harris boasts a long-term earnings growth rate of 9.2%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for its 2024 earnings implies an improvement of 9.4% from the 2023 reported figure.
Northrop Grumman NOC: As a pioneer in Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radars, NOC has been at the forefront of AESA innovations for more than 60 years. Its diverse product portfolio includes a handful of other radars like the F-35 fire control radar and the Distributed Aperture System, the LONGBOW Fire Control Radar, the Scalable Agile Beam Radar, the APR-39 DV (2), the EV(2) Radar Warning Receiver programs and a few more.
Northrop boasts a long-term earnings growth rate of 8.7%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for its 2024 sales implies an improvement of 4.6% from the 2023 reported figure.
Price Performance
The company’s shares have risen 11.4% in the past year against the industry’s decline of 10.1%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Zacks Rank
RTX currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
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