The U.S. Air Force has validated the loading and unloading procedures of its first air-launched hypersonic weapon with a B-52H Stratofortress bomber at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, paving the way for its scheduled deployment in 2023.

The validation of the process enables the AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response weapon to undergo live testing before the year ends and move to the production phase, Air Force Global Strike Command said Thursday. 

The ARRW is an air-to-ground missile designed to launch from a B-52H aircraft to neutralize high-value, time-sensitive targets.

During the validation process, airmen from the 2nd Maintenance Group, 307th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron worked with civilians from the ARRW and B-52H Stratofortress Systems Programs Office to develop standard procedures for loading the weapon onto the aircraft and unloading it.

“It demonstrates the far reaching capabilities of the B-52 and now projects its combat capabilities even further with the ARRW system,” said Master Sgt. Caleb Nolen, Air Force Global Strike B-52 armament systems manager.

In May, the ARRW launched from a B-52H bomber off the Southern California coast as part of a hypersonic weapon test effort to advance the development of the weapon system.

Northrop Grumman is scheduled to reveal its B-21 Raider during a highly-anticipated unveiling event at the company’s Palmdale, California facility on Friday evening, said CEO, President and Chair Kathy Warden in a CNBC interview.

For the past eight years, Northrop Grumman has been working with the U.S. Air Force to design, test and build the next generation strike aircraft, which Warden anticipates will equip the U.S. and our allies with an “information advantage.”

“The B-21 Raider is a long-range strike aircraft, and what that means is it has the range to go anywhere in the world and keep a target at risk. It also is a platform that is low-observable, and that means it can enter enemy airspace and not be detected,” said the seven-time Wash100 Award winner.

Notably, the B-21 has the ability to connect with other platforms — a function which closely aligns with the Department of Defense’s JADC2 initiative and its overarching goal to more closely link tactical and strategic networks.

Warden credited Northrop Grumman’s ability to deliver the B-21 on schedule and on budget to “digital engineering,” which she said has helped the company “iterate on thousands of designs and then translate those into the platform that the world will see tonight.”

Northrop Grumman’s B-21 Raider bomber is scheduled to make its first flight in early 2023, and the Falls Church, Virginia-based defense technology contractor currently has six B-21 Raiders in production. Early cost projections for the program hovered around $550 million per aircraft, but due to inflation, that estimation is now up to nearly $700 million per aircraft.

“We see the value creation for Northrop Grumman as still very much ahead of us as we move into this production phase,” Warden predicted. “The Air Force is talking about building at least a hundred aircraft.”

CNBC’s Morgan Brennan noted that Northrop Grumman is uniquely predicting top-line growth next year, while many other defense prime contractors are not. Warden explained that this projected growth is occurring “in spite of supply chain challenges” and because Northrop Grumman’s talent base is expanding.

“We are starting to see labor turn the corner, so we’re optimistic about 2023 and our ability to grow faster than we did in 2022,” said Warden. “The way we’re winning work and being successful on programs like the B-21 Raider is because our people are incredibly innovative and our talent is creating the ideas that solve our customers’ hardest problems.”

Northrop Grumman’s collaboration with the Air Force goes beyond the B-21 program. In late November, the Air Force exercised a contract option to purchase 42 F-16 aircraft radars from Northrop Grumman. Earlier this year, Northrop teamed up with Raytheon Technologies and won a $985 million contract to build and demonstrate a Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile.

The Defense Logistics Agency is working to enhance the Department of Defense’s visibility of the supply chain for the Lockheed Martin-built F-35 fighter aircraft, DOD reported Wednesday.

“The first attempt to making the supply chain more organically visible was to stand up DLA Distribution support, and as the fleet grows with different logistics and sustainment concepts evolving, we’ll continue to grow too,” said Rick Teal, program manager for DLA’s F-35 Supply Chain Integration Program.

According to Teal, DOD has initiated measures to increase its involvement in sustainment by transitioning to an organic management process amid the growth of the F-35 fleet, which is expected to reach approximately 1,400 aircraft by the end of 2025.

DLA, the F-35 joint program office and service branches are in the early planning phase as they work to determine how to shift sustainment management work from the contractor to the U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force in accordance with Section 142 of the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act.

“At this juncture the planning is immature, and even though it shifts sustainment responsibilities from the prime contractors to the services, changes will continue to leverage organic government facilities, capabilities and systems in addition to industrial capabilities — just like our support for other weapons systems,” Teal said.

Teal also cited DLA’s efforts to catalog the aircraft’s common parts and partnership with U.S. Transportation Command to tap into the latter’s shipping capabilities.