Israel Air Force Takes Delivery of First Conformal Airborne Early Warning & Control Aircraft

Released on Thursday, February 14, 2008

Elta Systems Ltd, an IAI (Israel Aerospace Industries Ltd.) Group and wholly owned subsidiary, will deliver on February, 2008, the first Conformal Airborne Early Warning & Control (CAEW) to the Israel Air Force (IAF).

Elta is the prime contractor, system developer and system integrator of the CAEW Program for the Israel Ministry of Defense (IMOD). The CAEW system, installed on a modified Gulfstream G550 aircraft, will be operated by the Israel Air Force for a variety of operational missions including Early Warning, Intelligence Gathering and Air Combat Command and Control.

The G550 aircraft was delivered to Israel in September 2006, after being modified by Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation (GAC) to accommodate the mission electronic equipment. Since its arrival to Israel the radars and other mission systems were installed, integrated and subjected to intensive ground and flight testing program.

Mr. Nissim Hadas, President of Elta Systems said: "The experience and dedication of Elta's engineers and the maturity of Elta's electronically scanned phased array technology have enabled us to test and prove the missions systems in flight and to deliver the system in record time. The CAEW radars and other mission equipment have demonstrated excellent performance during the flight tests. The Israel Air Force receives into its operational fleet the most advanced and cost effective AEW&C system in the world."

The CAEW includes a comprehensive Communication suite designed for Network Centric Operation (NCO). CAEW crew was trained using the Operational Training Simulator (OTS), delivered on August 2007, providing a complex NCO environment. During 2007, Israel Air Force crews participated in the CAEW flights and exercised operational procedures which supported gradual integration of the CAEW into the IAF Command and Control infrastructure.

The CAEW will join the Special Electronic Mission Aircraft (SEMA), three of which entered operational service in the Israel Air Force since 2006. The SEMA demonstrated outstanding performance in providing a real time picture of the Electronic Order of Battle (EOB).

The Israel Air Force G550 CAEW aircraft is the third generation of Airborne Early Warning and Control systems developed by Elta since mid-80s. Elta is a leader in radar and AEW&C technology and an international pioneer in the development and deployment of AEW&C utilizing state of art phased-phased array technology.