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Industry and Army collaborate at Picatinny Arsenal to advance grenade and fuze acquisition for warfighter innovation

By Eric Kowal July 30, 2025

PICATINNY ARSENAL, N.J. -- More than 70 industry partners exchanged ideas as part of a Grenade and Fuze Acquisition Contract Industry Day event at Picatinny Arsenal, July 23.

The event, hosted by the Joint Program Executive Office for Armaments and Ammunition's (JPEO A&A) Project Manager Close Combat Systems (PM CCS), allowed government officials to obtain industry feedback on the planned acquisition approach and perspectives on critical topics such as supply chain constraints and contract mechanisms.

"The JPEO A&A has many products, and we rely on numerous partners across the Organic and Commercial industry to accomplish our mission, which is to develop and deliver lethal capability to the Joint Warfighter and our international partners. The JPEO's role as the Single Manager for Conventional Ammunition enables us to procure for all the Services and Special Operations Command, ensuring we cost efficient and timely in our delivery of capabilities", said Col. Vinson Morris, PM CCS.

The meeting was initiated to encourage engagement and provide industry with an opportunity to influence the acquisition approach collaboratively, with the goal of developing the most efficient and effective strategy for procuring that ensures capability is provided to the Joint Warfighter the quickest and at a fair and reasonable cost to the taxpayer.

As the Project Manager, Morris and his team are committed to providing smaller, lighter, more lethal munitions that ensure increased mobility and counter-mobility to the full spectrum of Army forces as currently organized and envisioned for the next 20 years. To that end, PM CCS aggressively partners with Industry to develop and field equipment that directly addresses the Joint Warfighters' needs on the battlefield and beyond.

PM CCS is the longest chartered program management office in the U.S. Army, dating back to 1961 when it was named "PM Selected Ammunition." Today, PM CCS maintains a diverse portfolio and manages 44% of the Army's conventional munition lethality, more than 450 product lines, and executes 200 contracting actions per year.

To date PM CCS has provided hundreds of thousands of grenades, thousands of shoulder-launched munitions, and hundreds of mine clearing line charges to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

John Troup, Product Director of Conventional Ammunition Programs (PD CAPS) at the JPEO A&A, emphasized the key role that the Grenade and Fuze portfolio plays in strengthening the Army's strategic readiness and operational overmatch.

"Hand grenades and fuzes are more than legacy weapons; they are precision tools that can decisively shape the battlefield at the tactical edge".

Troup emphasized that "our focus is not only on lethality but also on survivability, supply chain resilience, and the incorporation of modern production standards that ensure our forces are never overmatched."

He highlighted that the proposed strategy reflects lessons learned from previous challenges and prioritizes responsiveness, industrial base agility, and affordability. Troup participated in One-on-Ones with industry partners and credited the success of Industry Day to the collective expertise by both government and industry partners.

To illustrate and underscore the significance of Picatinny's history in the field of munitions, the colonel displayed an incendiary grenade that was produced on the site of Picatinny Arsenal, approximately 250 years ago, in support of Gen. George Washington and the Continental Army.

Today, PM CCS still manages the current version, the M14 Incendiary Grenade, that is produced at Pine Bluff Arsenal located in Arkansas. Pine Bluff Arsenal is part of the Organic industrial base and was established to ensure readiness as the United States entered World War II. Pine Bluff also produces the family of Smoke Grenades and will receive fuzes for these grenades from this contracting action.

"The ceramic grenade body was found during construction at Lake Picatinny during the early 1980's," said Jeff Ranu, Picatinny Arsenal's Historian. "This was at the former location of the Middle Forge, which was in operation during the American Revolution. Clay from the lake was likely used to form the spherical body of the grenade, which explains the location."

PM CCS and the Army Contracting Command Rock Island (ACC RI) will review all the formal feedback received from their industry partners and will finalize the acquisition approach, brief and seek the approval of MG John Reim, the Milestone Decision Authority. Following this the PM team, ACC RI and Development Command Armament Center team members will pull together the draft Request for Proposals (RFP), release to industry for comments and then finalize and release the final RFP. This will begin the competitive award process with a planned award for no later than September 2026.

"As we look toward the future, events like this one stand as evidence of why Picatinny Arsenal remains irreplaceable, not only as a center of technical excellence, but as a strategic asset producing the lethality, agility, and reliability that modern combat demands. PM CCS continues to deliver solutions that ensure our Soldiers dominate in close combat, now and into the future," said Joseph Pelino, Deputy Project Manager, PM CCS.