Orbital is a major teammate on the Northrop Grumman-led industry team to conduct developmental and early-production phase design, engineering, manufacturing and testing for the Kinetic Energy Interceptors (KEI) missile defense program.
The KEI booster program is intended to provide the United States with the ability to intercept and destroy hostile missiles during their boost phase, when the missile is at its most vulnerable stage of its flight, before reentry vehicles, decoys or countermeasures can be deployed. KEI consists of a ground mobile launcher, and interceptor and command and control battle management communications deployable anywhere in the world using U.S. military aircraft. KEI will provide a land-based capability that can be quickly and easily adapted to sea-based platforms.
The KEI program is moving forward as a critical element of MDA's multi-layered defense system. It is planned as a complementary system to the other boost, midcourse, and terminal-phase defense interceptor programs currently under development and/or deployment.
