Lockheed Martin on July 6 announced it had signed a definitive agreement to acquire underwater warfare and anti-submarine firm Ultra Maritime for $3.45 billion in a bid to strengthen the defense contractor’s allied naval warfare capabilities.
Ultra Maritime, owned since 2022 by Cobham Ultra, a portfolio company of Boston-based private equity investor Advent, makes a wide range of anti-submarine warfare technologies, including sonobuoys, radar solutions, sonar technologies, torpedo defense systems, and autonomous artificial intelligence maritime sensing platforms for the United States, the UK, Canada, Australia, and other allied navies in more than 30 countries.
Ultra Maritime’s defense systems can be deployed by air, on the ocean surface, or underwater. Its sonobuoys are dropped from planes to scout for submarines, while its hull-mounted sonar and towed acoustic arrays can be towed behind ships to track submarines and incoming enemy torpedoes. In February, Ultra Maritime was awarded a development contract by the U.S. Navy to produce next-generation acoustical countermeasure systems to better protect submarines from undersea threats….