The US Army decided to replace the Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, which have been in service for more than four decades. Two companies will compete for the right to create an heir: American Rheinmetall and General Dynamics.

What is known

The US Army this week officially announced the transition to a new stage of the Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle (OMFV) program. Initially, five companies took part in the project. In addition to American Rheinmetall and General Dynamics, BAE Systems, Oshkosh Defense and Point Blank Enterprises received contracts five years ago.

The potential cost of the program is $45 billion. The next stage of the competition involves the allocation of $1.6 billion to American Rheinmetall and General Dynamics. At this stage, they must offer a prototype of a promising infantry fighting vehicle for testing, which is called the XM30 Mechanized Infantry Combat Vehicle.

American Rheinmetall wants to use the Lynx KF-41 infantry fighting vehicle (pictured above). To create it, the company joined forces with Raytheon and L3Harris. It is equipped with a 50mm cannon, thermal sights and can launch drones.

General Dynamics offers the Griffin III (pictured above). It is based on the chassis of the Ajax reconnaissance vehicle with a 50mm cannon. The combat vehicle can launch Switchblade drones. To do this, General Dynamics is partnering with AeroVironment.

Source: US Army