- Kestrel supports NGC2 airspace and mission planning needs
- Hardware-agnostic, containerized software for cloud or unit-provided hardware
- The Potomac Officers Club will host the 2027 Defense R&D Summit on Feb. 4
General Dynamics Mission Systems has won a $99 million Army contract for Kestrel, its airspace command and control software, becoming the latest vendor to receive an award tied to the service’s Next Generation Command and Control, or NGC2, effort.
The Army issued the firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract for commercial technology offerings in late September, the Chantilly, Virginia, business unit said Wednesday.
Department of War technology officials and industry executives will convene on Feb. 4 for the Potomac Officers Club’s 2027 Defense R&D Summit, where one panel will address how to engineer networks that survive a contested fight. Save your seat now.
What Is Kestrel?
Kestrel delivers services and user workflows for NGC2 airspace and mission planning, running as containerized software that is hardware-agnostic and can run within larger cloud-based capabilities or on hardware a unit already has.
“The modern battlefield brings aircraft, uncrewed systems, fires and air defense into increasingly complex airspace,” said Rachel Oberc, a vice president at GDMS.
“Kestrel unifies mission planning and airspace command and control, helping operators coordinate faster and adapt as conditions change,” she continued,
How Does the Award Fit the Army’s NGC2 Rollout?
The Army declared NGC2 ready to scale after a 10-month prototyping campaign that ran through exercises, including Ivy Sting, Ivy Mass and Lightning Surge with the 4th and 25th Infantry Divisions, concluding with Project Convergence-Capstone 6 at Fort Irwin, California, in July. The service plans to field the capability to all 11 divisions within the five-year Future Years Defense Program at a pace of two to three divisions a year, with I Corps first.
Awards have followed quickly. Anduril Industries took a five-year contract worth up to $1.8 billion in October to field the NGC2 common data layer, with a $162.8 million base period. Shift5 received a five-year, $99 million award the same month, and Air, formerly Govini, landed a potential five-year, $200 million Department of War contract for NGC2 software delivery beginning with I Corps.
More than 60 companies are contributing to the NGC2 ecosystem, and the Army said it will continue to adjust vendor participation as the capability reaches more formations.
What Is the Army Spending on NGC2?
The service requested $3.8 billion across procurement and research and development for NGC2 in its fiscal 2027 budget, a 28 percent increase over the $3 billion provided in fiscal 2026.
The research portion covers integration, delivery, deployment and systems engineering across the command and control applications, data, infrastructure and transport layers. Procurement funds go toward fielding capabilities and infrastructure. The request would field two divisions with the full NGC2 stack in fiscal 2027 and support the goal of replacing legacy Warfighter Information Network-Tactical equipment.
