MELBOURNE, Fla., 29 Nov. 2005. The U.S. Air Force has awarded Northrop Grumman Corp. a five-year, $532 million contract for the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (Joint STARS) System Improvement Program to provide systems design and development improvements to the E-8C Joint STARS fleet.

The contract covers the engineering, design, development, integration, test and delivery of various enhancements and upgrades to the Joint STARS fleet for the period of the contract. It also includes items such as technical orders, support equipment, initial spares and training and procurement of production and support-system retrofit kits and documentation.

The E-8C Joint STARS is the world's most advanced wide-area airborne ground-surveillance, targeting and battle-management system. It detects, locates, classifies, tracks and targets hostile ground movements, communicating real-time information through secure data links with Air Force and U.S. Army command posts.

All Joint STARS aircraft are assigned to the Georgia Air National Guard's 116th Air Control Wing, a "total-force blended wing," based at Robins Air Force Base, Warner Robins, Ga. The wing comprises active-duty Air Force, Army and Air National Guard personnel.

"This is an important step toward upgrading these low-density, high-demand aircraft to maintain their viability to the warfighter," said Dave Nagy, vice president of the Joint STARS program for Northrop Grumman. "Joint STARS will be in the Defense Department's intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance constellation for many years to come so it's important that we can continue to add capability to this unique aircraft."

Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems, the prime contractor for the E-8C production and whole-life support programs, is a premier aerospace and defense systems integration organization. Headquartered in El Segundo, Calif., it designs, develops, produces and supports network-enabled integrated systems and subsystems optimized for use in networks. For its government and civil customers worldwide, Integrated Systems delivers best-value solutions, products and services that support military and homeland defense missions in the areas of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; space access; battle management command and control; and integrated strike warfare. For more information, see www.northropgrumman.com.