With new sales to two nations due for imminent signing, Lockheed Martin is displaying its Precision Attack Navigation and Targeting pod (Pantera) at the show with confidence that further acquisitions will be forthcoming.
"We have two orders that we expect to be signed very quickly, for Poland and Oman," says Zak Tomczak, deputy director for international business development in the Middle East – targeting systems. Sealing the deals (22 for Poland, seven for Oman) is imminent, although they may not be finalised until early in 2004.
The contracts come on the back of the delivery of the first exports last month – the first of a batch of nine for Norway.
Infra-red
Pantera is the export version of the Sniper Extended Range (XR) pod being produced for the US Air Force and Air National Guard; the Norwegian order took the number of purchased pods to 56.
Sniper XR/Pantera is designed to provide targeting for modern air-to-ground weaponry and combines forward-looking infra-red, a laser spot marker and tracker and television in a 175kg (400lb) pod.
It has recently completed Operational Utility Evaluation on the F-15E and pre-qualification, test and evaluation on the F-16 Block 30 and Block 50.
Tomczak believes the pod's maintainability will be a major selling point: "It has 40 line-replaceable units (LRUs), 600h MTBF and takes just 14min to replace any LRU. We can lay out this pod on the floor and assemble and test it with one man in 40min.
"When we upgrade it in the future it will be merely by switching an LRU and giving some new instructions to the pilot on how to use that particular aspect."
Source: Flight Daily News
