Lockheed Martin Bolsters Australia's Air Defense with $950M Contract

"This next phase of Project AIR 6500 fortifies the core of Australia’s integrated air and missile defense system," Lockheed Martin Australia and New Zealand chief executive Jeremy King said in a company press release today.

Lockheed Martin Australia: the new $1.32B AUD sustainment and expansion contract

Lockheed Martin Australia announced it has been awarded a 1.32 billion AUD (950 million USD) contract to sustain and expand Australia’s joint air battle management system as part of Project AIR6500 Tranche 2B. The company framed the work as strengthening the AIR6500 core architecture and as a component of a broader Australian effort to modernize air and missile defence capabilities, according to the release.

AIR6500 Tranche 2B: advanced C2 aids, expanded comms, and cyber‑security

The contract will enhance AIR6500’s core architecture with “advanced C2 aids, expanded comms, and cyber‑security to maintain resilient, networked sensor and C2 capabilities,” Lockheed Martin’s news release said. Those enhancements are intended to allow the system to sense and track incoming threats and to integrate with the Australian Defence Force’s targeting enterprise, allies and partners. Lockheed Martin said the Tranche 2B work will also establish a “scalable path” for future improvements and integration of future technological advances.

How the joint air battle management system connects platforms and domains

The company described the joint air battle management system as integrating Australia’s air and missile defence capabilities “across all-domains into a single, unified view of the battlespace to detect and counter threats at various ranges.” The Australian Department of Defence, in a separate release accompanying the announcement, said the capability will connect current and future Defence platforms, including Hobart-class destroyers, the F-35A Lightning II aircraft and the accelerated Medium-Range Ground-Based Air Defence system.

Australian Department of Defence: $2.4B AUD investment over six years

The Lockheed Martin award is part of a wider Australian Department of Defence package announced the same day: a 2.4 billion AUD investment over six years to modernise air surveillance and aircraft control functions and to support coordination of Defence operations in Australia and overseas. Defence Minister Richard Marles called Project AIR6500 “a landmark investment in Australia’s air defense capability” and said the system “will help ensure the Australian Defence Force can respond effectively to future threats and deliver on the priorities of both the National Defence Strategy and the Defence Industry Development Strategy,” per the departmental release.

NASAMS reaches Final Operational Capability; Raytheon Australia noted

Also announced today was a separate milestone for Australia’s short-range ground-based air defence: the Australian Army’s National Advanced Surface to Air Missile System (NASAMS) capability has attained Final Operational Capability. Australia acquired, in 2017, two batteries of three NASAMS launchers each under a contract with Raytheon Australia. The department’s announcement said this milestone confirms NASAMS “has met all requirements for operational service and is ready to support Australian Defence Force (ADF) operations.”

What this means for the Australian Defence Force, allies and procurement leaders

• For the Australian Defence Force: the Tranche 2B work is framed as delivering a scalable, resilient platform that brings ADF defence assets together to provide clearer cross‑domain awareness and a more effective way to respond to air and missile threats.
• For allies and partners: Lockheed Martin and the Defence Department explicitly tied AIR6500’s integration to interoperability, noting integration with the ADF’s targeting enterprise, allies and partners and listing platforms such as the F-35A and Hobart-class destroyers as connected elements.
• For procurement and defence-industry planners: the contract forms part of a 2.4 billion AUD, six‑year investment and is presented as a deliberate step to create a “scalable path” for future technological integration — a signal that follow‑on tranches and system additions are expected to be accommodated.

The announcement ties three threads together: a large sustainment-and-expansion award to Lockheed Martin Australia; a departmental funding package meant to modernise surveillance and control across platforms; and the confirmation that NASAMS has reached operational readiness after the 2017 purchase through Raytheon Australia. Taken together, the statements in the releases underline a concerted Australian effort to bind sensing, command-and-control, and shooter systems into a single, networked picture — and to leave room for future capability growth.

Original reporting: https://breakingdefense.com/2026/09/lockheed-martin-secures-950m-australian-air-battle-management-contract/