Aircraft
U.S. Radar Firms Offering Next-Gen AESA Designs
Raytheon, Northrup Grumman introduce AESA for fifth-generation fighters and earlier iterations.
The PhantomStrike AESA's light weight helps make it an ideal rardar for the KAI F-50. (Image: Raytheon)
The PhantomStrike AESA's light weight helps make it an ideal rardar for the KAI F-50. (Image: Raytheon)

U.S. radar design and production firms Raytheon (RTX) and Northrop Grumman (NG) are both introducing new, next-generation fighter aircraft radars based on active electronic scanning array (AESA) technology.  The new designs provide cutting-edge combat performance to both fifth-generation fighters now in production—as well as previous generation platforms.

Raytheon and Northrop Grumman manufacture their respective PhantomStrike and APG-85 systems with transmit/receive modules (TRMs) based on GaN (gallium nitride) semiconductor materials, in contrast with both companies’ previous AESA fighter radars, built with TRMs based on gallium arsenide (GaAs).