L3Harris has unveiled a new platform based on the Bombardier Global 6500 to replace the NATO fleet of 14 Boeing E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft.

The L3Harris offering proposes to transfer—or “cross-deck”—a conformal airborne early warning (CAEW) mission system already integrated on the out-of-production Gulfstream G550 to the military derivative of the Canadian-built, large cabin business jet. 

“Our system, cross decked on Bombardier’s Global 6500, will rapidly enhance mission readiness while providing interoperability between partner nations to support future multidomain operations,” said Dave Johnson, vice president of L3Harris International. 

The NATO configuration proposal comes four months after L3Harris announced the same cross-decked Global 6500 CAEW platform for South Korea, with Israel Aerospace Systems’ Elta Division and Korean Air Lines as key suppliers. 

Elta is supplying an updated version of the EL/W-2085 multiband radar system for airborne early warning and control. The system features two S-band frequency arrays on each side of the fuselage, plus L-band arrays in the tail and nose. A common processor stitches a common airborne picture in real-time from all four arrays. 

The integrated arrays allow the CAEW platform to provide 360-deg. radar coverage around the aircraft without a top-mounted, rotating array. The G550 version of the system is now in service with Israel, Italy, Singapore and the U.S. Navy. 

The L3Harris proposal will compete with several other concepts for the NATO Alliance Future Surveillance and Control (AFSC) program.

In May, three industry consortia—the Boeing-led Abiliti group, the Airbus/Northrop Grumman Aspaaro team and a third unnamed group led by General Atomics—completed initial studies for AFSC, which were commissioned by NATO’s Support and Procurement Agency. 

NATO originally planned to replace the E-3 with a distributed platform solution in 2035, but also is considering options for a near-term fleet acquisition, with the Boeing E-7, Northrop E-2D and Saab GoldenEye among the likely platforms to be proposed.