US Navy awards Raytheon $24.4 billion to quadruple SM-6 missile production over five years.

The U.S. Navy awarded Raytheon a multi-year contract valued at up to $24.4 billion to significantly scale the production of Standard Missile-6 interceptors. The five-year agreement, which includes two additional option years, aims to establish long-term manufacturing stability and expand industrial throughput for critical defense reserves. This production acceleration provides sustained magazine depth across complex anti-air warfare, anti-surface warfare, and ballistic missile defense missions.

The maximum-value procurement contract scales manufacturing lines to increase annual yields of the SM-6 multi-role interceptor well beyond historical delivery rates. This multi-year agreement provides the defense industrial base with long-term fiscal clarity to expand automation, facility footprints, and component supply chains across solid rocket motors and guidance electronics.

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The SM-6 repeatedly extended its own engagement-distance record, setting what was then the longest surface-to-air intercept in U.S. Navy history in June 2014 before surpassing that record in January 2016 and again in September 2016, although the exact ranges remain classified. (Picture source: US DoD)

On October 1, 2026, the U.S. Navy awarded Raytheon a five-year contract with two option years worth up to $24.4 billion to increase the production of SM-6 surface-to-air missiles, establishing the contractual basis to sustain an output above 500 missiles per year. The FY2027 plan seeks 540 Standard Missile-6s (SM-6s) for $4.3 billion, or $7.96 million in procurement funding per requested missile, though this is not a flyaway unit price. A 500-missile annual rate is four times the 125-per-year average under the 2019 authorization for 625 missiles over five years, while 540 is 4.32 times higher. Sustaining 500 annually for five years would yield at least 2,500 missiles, 700 above the original 1,800-missile acquisition objective, although the contract does not specify that quantity. Raytheon has expanded its workforce and automation and completed a $115 million expansion of its Alabama missile facility, while the $24.4 billion remains a maximum contract value dependent on future appropriations rather than money immediately obligated.

The production challenge extends well beyond final assembly because each RIM-174 Standard Extended Range Active Missile (ERAM), also known as Standard Missile 6 (SM-6), is a 6.6 m-long, 1,500 kg two-stage missile integrating propulsion, guidance electronics, an active radar seeker, control surfaces, fuzing, and a 64 kg blast-fragmentation warhead. The Block IA has a 0.34 m body diameter, increasing to 0.53 m around the booster, a 1.07 m wingspan, and a maximum speed of Mach 3.5, equivalent to 4,288 km/h or 1.2 km/s. Guidance combines inertial and midcourse control with active and semi-active radar homing, using an active seeker derived from the AIM-120C AMRAAM architecture. Published range figures extend from 240 km to 460 km depending on engagement conditions and estimates, while the USS John Finn demonstrated a 400 km anti-surface engagement in April 2021. The production chain must therefore increase output simultaneously across solid rocket motors, seekers, electronics, warheads, airframes and final integration rather than simply adding missile assembly capacity.

The active seeker gives the SM-6 a different engagement geometry from earlier Standard Missiles because it can receive Aegis midcourse updates before using its own radar for terminal acquisition, reducing the missile's dependence on the firing ship's illuminators. This permits engage-on-remote firing against targets tracked by another ship, aircraft or networked sensor beyond the launcher's radar horizon. Between June 18 and 20, 2014, for instance, the USS John Paul Jones fired four SM-6s and achieved what was then the U.S. Navy's longest surface-to-air interception, although the distance remained classified. On October 24, 2014, SM-6s intercepted a supersonic GQM-163A and a subsonic BQM-74E using targeting information from another Aegis ship, followed by five target kills during maximum down-range and cross-range testing in January 2016. The practical effect is that detection and launch can occur from different locations, allowing one ship's Mk 41 cells to engage threats tracked by sensors positioned closer to them.

Ballistic missile defense (BMD) creates a second major claim on the same SM-6 inventory. An SM-6 Dual I intercepted a ballistic target during terminal descent on July 28, 2015, providing an endo-atmospheric layer complementary to the SM-3's midcourse role, and two Dual I missiles engaged an MRBM-class target on December 14, 2016. The test history also includes a failure: during FTM-31 Event 1 on May 29, 2021, two Dual II missiles engaged two MRBM targets, but only one target was intercepted. Two Dual II missiles were salvo-fired again on March 30, 2023, producing the first MRBM interception with the Dual II Software Upgrade, followed by another successful SWUP interception involving the USS Jack H. Lucas and its AN/SPY-6 radar on March 19, 2024. However, salvo firing means ballistic missile defense can consume multiple SM-6s per engagement, making missile consumption materially higher than a simple one-missile-per-threat calculation.

Anti-surface warfare creates a third claim for those same missiles and Mk 41 cells. An SM-6 fired by USS John Paul Jones sank the decommissioned USS Reuben James on January 18, 2016. The missile's warhead is substantially smaller than the more than 200 kg payload carried by some dedicated anti-ship missiles, so its effect against a large combatant cannot be equated with a heavy anti-ship weapon purely on the basis of range. Its different value lies in combining an active seeker with Mach 3.5 speed and an existing Mk 41 launch interface. At 1.2 km/s, 100 km corresponds to 83 seconds and 50 km to 42 seconds if that velocity were maintained, although actual speed varies during flight. Mk 41 compatibility also eliminates a separate anti-ship launcher requirement, but creates a magazine tradeoff because every SM-6 allocated to surface attack logically occupies a cell unavailable for air defense, ballistic missile defense or another VLS weapon.

The SM-6 Block IB adds another manufacturing variable while production is being quadrupled. Block I and IA use a missile body 0.34 m in diameter, whereas Block IB incorporates a 0.53 m motor, increasing diameter by 56% and cross-sectional area by 2.4 times, although this does not directly translate into the same increase in propellant volume. In fact, the larger motor is intended to increase both range and speed and move the missile into hypersonic-class performance while retaining its anti-surface role. In March 2025, Anduril completed two live-fire tests of a 0.53 m hypersonic rocket motor associated with the SM-6 second stage, while FTX-40 Stellar Banshee evaluated a virtualized SM-6 Block IAU against an MRBM carrying the HTV-1 hypersonic test vehicle without firing a physical interceptor. Raytheon and its suppliers therefore have to raise current SM-6 output while accommodating a propulsion architecture materially different from the configuration originally placed into production.

Demand has also expanded beyond Aegis warships. The U.S. Army selected the SM-6 in November 2020 for the Mid-Range Capability, now Strategic Mid-Range Fires, with Typhon mobile launchers employing SM-6s alongside Tomahawks for long-range strike and anti-ship missions. Naval aviation draws from the same missile lineage through the AIM-174B, which removes the Mk 72 booster because the F/A-18E/F supplies initial altitude and velocity; the U.S. Navy publicly acknowledged its operational deployment in July 2024. The AIM-174B also became the Navy's first dedicated long-range air-to-air missile since the AIM-54 Phoenix left service in 2004. The SM-6 production base consequently supports Mk 41-equipped ships, Army Typhon batteries, and F/A-18E/F missile inventories across air defense, terminal ballistic missile defense, anti-surface warfare, land-based fires, and long-range air-to-air combat.

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Written by Jérôme Brahy

Jérôme Brahy is a defense analyst and documentalist at Army Recognition. He specializes in naval modernization, aviation, drones, armored vehicles, and artillery, with a focus on strategic developments in the United States, China, Ukraine, Russia, South Korea, Türkiye, and Belgium. His analyses go beyond the facts, providing context, identifying key actors, and explaining why defense news matters on a global scale.