Surface Ship Sonar Market Continues to Ascend

An unsung but consistent and growing military electronics market is the naval surface ship sonar market. Despite immediate land-war developments in Ukraine – which again emphasize the importance of airborne C4ISR – surface ship sonar programs have received major new funding for the past decade, especially in the past few years, as the Asia/Pacific threat from China has grown. With quiet diesel submarines probably still the most feared game-changer that could cause the sudden loss of an American Supercarrier, funding for all types of ship sonars will continue to grow over the next decade.

By far the most dominant and important system has long been Lockheed Martin’s AN/SQQ-89(V) Surface ASW (Anti-Submarine Warfare) Combat System, an integrated naval surface combatant sonar/fire control system combining a bow-mounted sonar, towed-array sonar, fire control system, and sonobuoy processor. SQQ-89 planned production will continue for at least another decade, and upgrades will probably still be funded when we are all dead, as most of the Navy’s major surface combatants carry the system(s). The SQQ-89 will be worth $3.3 billion in our forecast period (when including funding for L3Harris’ [was EDO] AN/SQS-53 hull sonar).

The much smaller, lame-duck ASW Sonar programs for the DDG-1000 Zumwalt class Destroyers & Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) will be worth much less – only $250 million and $500 million respectively over the next ten years.

Serving a different but equally vital purpose as detecting and prosecuting submarines, newer versions of Raytheon’s AN/AQS-20A/C & Northrop Grumman AN/AQS-24 MCM (Mine Countermeasures) systems will be worth $2.5 billion over the next ten years, with their primary future platform perhaps being the now-looking-for-a-mission LCS. As many as 24 new MCM Mission Package (MP) systems might be procured – perhaps becoming the primary LCS sensor/mission.

And our new, speculative Future Naval MCM (Mine Countermeasures) Sensors forecast will see $800 million in so-far uncontracted funding over the next decade, for various procurement programs and RDT&E.

*To show how ubiquitous is Lockheed’s SQQ-89, it is in production for the DDG-51 Arleigh Burke class destroyer, and versions of the SQQ-89 form the basis of Raytheon’s DDG-1000 Zumwalt class destroyer’s AN/SQQ-90 sonar & ASW suite as well as the new Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) ASW Mission Package (a very reduced version). The Ticonderoga (CG-47) class cruisers also carry the SQQ-89.

The Navy’s new FFG-62 Constellation class Frigate will also mount a version of Lockheed’s well-established SQQ-89(V)15 – the SQQ-89F (without the AN/SQS-53 hull sonar) – as well as the AN/SQS-62 Variable Depth Sonar. Earlier plans were for the FFG(X) to carry either a version of Raytheon’s SQQ-90 or a version of the LCS ASW Mission Package.

See Teal Group’s Military Electronics Briefing for a complete analysis and forecasts for these and other surface ship, airborne, and submarine sonar systems.