Bell Forms Industry Team to Build Helicopter for Army FARA Competition

Textron’s Bell subsidiary has partnered with nine other companies to manufacture a helicopter prototype in pursuit of the U.S. Army's Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft program.

Members of Team Invictus will provide engines, components and avionics systems for the Bell 360 aircraft platform in their joint bid to help address the military service's multidomain aviation operations requirement, Textron said Thursday.

The Army shortlisted Bell and Lockheed Martin’s Sikorsky subsidiary in March to submit prototypes through the FARA competition for a flight demonstration that is scheduled to occur in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022.

Chris Gehler, vice president and director of the FARA program at Bell, said Team Invictus aims to demonstrate how new technology will help warfighters operate in complex and contested environments.

“Future Vertical Lift is critical for the Army’s ability to win in multi-domain operations with FARA defeating defensive layers and the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) exploiting opened areas to achieve operational objectives.”

Bell's team members are:

• Astronics
• Collins Aerospace, a business unit of Raytheon Technologies
• GE Aviation
• ITT-Enidine 
• L3Harris Technologies
• Parker Lord
• Mecaer Aviation
• MOOG
• TRU Simulation + Training