Reuters:
Rick Edwards, who heads Lockheed’s missiles and fire control business, told Reuters that he expected project partner MBDA to complete the proposal – which includes work by Lockheed and many other suppliers – by the end of the month or early next month.
The outlook follows comments in a German defense ministry document that negotiations with Lockheed and MBDA on the system might not finish by a year-end target, a position rival Raytheon Co seized on as a sign the program was running into trouble.”The proposal will get in fairly soon,” Edwards said at the Farnborough International Airshow.He said he met with a senior German official on Tuesday at the airshow to discuss the issue and negotiations would start once the proposal was submitted.Edwards said it was possible that contract negotiations with the German government about the Medium Extended Air Defense System, or MEADS, could slip into early next year, as suggested by the German defense ministry document.But he said lawmakers could still approve the deal as long as it was done in the first three months of the year, before the German national election cycle kicks off in earnest ahead of the September vote.
