SINGAPORE — Boeing’s MQ-28 Ghost Bat Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) will gain internal weapons bays along with an increased wingspan, the global program director announced during this week’s Singapore Airshow.
Speaking at a media briefing here on Wednesday, Glen Ferguson told reporters that Block 3 aircraft will be able to carry weapons such as the AIM-120 medium range air-to-air missile and the Small Diameter Bomb.
Ferguson was keen to stress, however, that the only constraint on the types of payloads that could be carried in the bays was physical, with the Ghost Bat’s modularity and open architecture meaning that a variety of weapons could be integrated on it as long as it fit the bays.
This modularity and open architecture also mean that the CCA is able to carry different payloads in its nose depending on user or mission requirements, including electronic warfare payloads as well as infra-red search and track systems.
“It’s really up to the customers what they want,” he said.
Boeing is working on “three or four” other sensor payloads, although Ferguson declined to go into further details about these.
Also changing for Block 3 is the aircraft’s wingspan, which will expand from 6 meters to 7.3 meters, or 20 to 24 feet. The increased wingspan will allow the Ghost Bat to carry more fuel, increasing its range, Ferguson said.
Boeing is currently developing the Ghost Bat in Australia for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), which has ordered an additional seven aircraft, including the first in Block 3 configuration for delivery in 2028 to develop an operational capability with the type.
He also touched on foreign interest on the Ghost Bat, revealing that there are ongoing conversations with “a lot” of potential customers and highlighting an agreement between Australia and Japan to collaborate on the program during a bilateral defense ministers’ meeting in September 2025.
Ferguson emphasized that the modularity and the flexibility of the CCA’s design will allow foreign users of the aircraft to integrate their own capabilities on the platform.
“They can adopt their own sensors if they wish, and they can apply their own weapons without needing to have to involve us at the levels you might expect on a normal crewed platform.”
That sovereign capability and development is all about partnerships and relationships, and we are looking to share that with other countries as they look to embrace a CCA capability.”