Lockheed Martin has confirmed it has been selected for the second phase of the U.S. Army’s Flight School Next (FSN) competition, joining Bell and M1 in the battle to provide a replacement for the Airbus Helicopters UH-72A Lakota as the service’s primary rotary-wing training aircraft.
The Army has said it wants a turnkey contrator-owned and contractor-operated solution to train Initial Entry Rotary Wing (IERW) student pilots at Fort Rucker, Alabama.
A Call for Solutions (C4S) was issued in December 2025, with submissions due later that month. It called for a solution that used commercially available services and equipment on a single contract to provide annual training for between 900 and 1,500 rotary wing pilots.
“The contractor shall provide all services and equipment required to train pilots to a U.S. Army standard equivalent to the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) commercial helicopter pilot certification, including single-engine aircraft, parts, maintenance, instructors (both academic and flight), and simulation (if required),” the C4S stated.
The Army is believed to prefer a single-engine type to reduce cost and increase efficiency over the Lakota, which has been used for IERW training at Fort Rucker since 2016.
Lockheed has not yet announced what type it has proposed in its bid, or other potential partners — though this is expected to be revealed later this month.
“We are honored to be selected by the U.S. Army to advance to Phase II of the Flight School Next competition and look forward to presenting how our turnkey training solution addresses their requirements for a modern training enterprise,” said Todd Morar, vice president of Air and Commercial Solutions at Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems, in a statement provided to Vertical.
The company joins Bell and M1 in confirming its progress to the next stage of the competition.
Bell is proposing the light single-engine Bell 505 for the program, and said it was also leveraging its Bell Training Academy in Fort Worth, Texas and modern training technology as part of its bid.
“We are honored to move forward in the Army’s Flight School Next program,” said Jeffrey Schloesser, senior vice president of strategic pursuits at Bell. “With Bell’s extensive history in military flight training, the proven Bell 505 and the expertise of our teammates, we are confident that our turnkey solution will support the Army in developing the next generation of aviation warfighters.”
During a media briefing last year, Bell had said it would propose an instrument flight rules (IFR)-capable version of the 505, and that the type would provide a high operational readiness rate, and offer more sustainability and durability than the existing training fleet.
Carl Coffman, VP of military sales and strategy at Bell, said the 505 would allow the Army to get back to training “the basics of flying,” during the March briefing.
In a statement released Jan. 8, M1 Support Services said it submitted two different proposals to the Army, and both of them have been advanced to Phase II.
“We started developing our approach nearly two years ago, and that early start allowed us time to develop a comprehensive solution optimized to best meet Army objectives,” said George Krivo, chairman and CEO of M1.
Quantum Helicopters, The University of North Dakota, General Dynamics Information Technology, and Robinson Helicopter have all been named as part of M1’s bids.
In a statement provided to Vertical, Robinson confirmed it has progressed to Phase to of FSN “as part of several Prime bids.”
“This follows the documented success of our R66 aircraft, which continues to demonstrate high reliability in both U.S. Army and Navy training environments,” said David Smith, president and CEO of Robinson Helicopter Company.
“We look forward to sharing further updates regarding our participation in the FSN program in the days and weeks to come.”
None of the other known bidders have confirmed their progress. These included a joint proposal from Boeing and Leonardo with the AW119T, and Airbus Helicopters (which resubmitted the UH-72 Lakota). MD Helicopters (with the MD 530) and Enstrom Helicopters (480B) had also proposed aircraft as subcontractors.
