San Diego, California – February 23, 2026 – GE Aerospace and Kratos Defense & Security Solutions announced the signing of a joint contract with the United States Air Force in the amount of $12.4 million to develop a next-generation jet engine for small Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA).
The initial phase of the program includes the completion of the early design of the GEK1500 engine, which has been designed to meet stringent performance requirements while maintaining ambitious cost targets, with the goal of enabling large-scale serial production at an accessible price.
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GEK1500: Emphasis on performance and mass production
The GEK1500 will be a 1,500 lb thrust engine designed to equip:
- unmanned aerial systems (UAS)
- Cooperative Combat Aircraft (CCA)
missiles
The new engine is based on the GEK800 architecture, an engine originally developed for cruise missiles and currently in an advanced stage of technological maturation. According to the companies, lessons learned from recent GEK800 high-altitude trials are incorporated directly into the design GEK1500.
According to Steve “Dougie” Russell, vice president and general manager of Edison Works at GE Aerospace, the experiments enabled progress in the following areas:
- increasing impulse
- Improving electricity production capacity
- Reducing life cycle costs
- Improving the operational range
These technological achievements are expected to reduce technical risks, costs and schedules in the development of the new engine.
A contractual option expands the technical scope
The contract also includes an additional option, which the Air Force may exercise for the purpose of deepening the design risk analysis and characterizing the engine’s performance under representative operational flight and integration conditions.
The US Air Force (USAF) prioritizes high-performance, low-cost engines, which are considered essential to the realization of the innovative concept of small CCAs — unmanned platforms that are supposed to operate alongside manned combat aircraft in high-threat environments.
The GEK1500 program is another step in establishing an industrial infrastructure focused on low-cost tactical engines, a component considered critical to the United States’ future distributed air warfare architecture.
Source and photos: GE Aerospace News. This content is generated with the help of artificial intelligence and reviewed by the editorial team.
