U.S. manufacturer General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) revealed recently that a foreign nation is interested in buying 90 Predator C Avenger unmanned aircraft, offering an indication of the potential future roles it sees not only for the jet-powered Avenger but also for the turboprop-powered MQ-9 Predator B.

During a roundtable meeting with reporters August 16 at GA-ASI’s headquarters in Poway, California, company president David Alexander said an international buyer he declined to identify has expressed interest in “a quantity of 90” Avengers. That number approximates the 100 or more Predator Cs India has said it needs—a requirement New Delhi revealed in late 2015. The prospect of the U.S. government approving such a sale improved when India became the 35th and latest country to gain entry to the Missile Technology Control Regime, a missile non-proliferation pact, in June 2016.

More recently, the U.S. and Indian governments have discussed the sale of 22 General Atomics MQ-9B Sea Guardians the Indian Navy seeks for maritime surveillance. GA-ASI confirmed media reports in late June that Washington has approved the transaction. The MQ-9B will be certified to NATO airworthiness standards, improving on the earlier MQ-9 Block 1 and 5 models. Another country interested in the MQ-9B is Japan, according to the manufacturer.

Robert Walker, GA-ASI senior director of strategic development, said that any sale of 90 Avengers is not imminent. “This opportunity is still in the process of being developed and there’s still quite a lot of work that needs to be done to refine and shape the requirements,” he told reporters.

During the two-day media tour, GA-ASI flew reporters to its flight operations facility at Gray Butte Field Airport, near Victorville, California, where a Predator C the manufacturer has advanced for humanitarian aid drops was parked in a hangar alongside several other unmanned aircraft. Several more MQ-9 Reapers and one MQ-1 Predator were parked near the runway at the desert airfield—a site the U.S. Air Force uses for developmental testing and, via the Defense Contract Management Agency, production acceptance of new unmanned aircraft.

The Predator C, named “Angel One” and registered as N901PC, is distinguished as the first jet-powered unmanned aircraft system to receive Federal Aviation Administration experimental certification, according to GA-ASI. The manufacturer developed it as a proof-of-concept delivery vehicle for humanitarian supplies after being approached by an investor who later withdrew from the project.

A company-owned “capital aircraft,” Angel One is one of nine Pratt & Whitney PW545B-powered Avengers that GA-ASI reports producing; the Air Force owns another Predator C and a “classified” U.S. government customer, thought to be the CIA, possesses up to seven more. In October, GA-ASI conducted the first flight of an Avenger ER variant with a 76-foot wingspan—longer by 10 feet—and advertised maximum endurance of 20 hours compared to Angel One’s six hours.

“It’s a very affordable aircraft that is high-altitude with a very large sensor bay” that accommodates a large aperture sensor such as the UTC Aerospace Systems MS-177 multi-spectral, long-range imaging sensor, Alexander said of the Predator C generally. “You can carry it up there, you can see long distances, so if you wanted to fly this airplane along the border and look into somebody else’s country, deep-in, [you could do] something like that. Anything that carries something large within the airframe—that aircraft has an advantage, like a laser weapon could fit in there, for example.”

The Predator C may also be GA-ASI’s baseline for building the U.S. Navy’s MQ-25 Stingray carrier-based aerial refueling aircraft. In April, the Naval Air Systems Command (Navair) awarded GA-ASI, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman contract amendments to refine their concepts for the Stingray air vehicle, setting a September 2018 completion date. In late July, Navair released a draft request for proposals for the MQ-25; the final RFP is expected this fall, USNI News reported.

The manufacturer also has future plans for the MQ-9, which is powered by the Honeywell TPE331-10 turboprop engine. Parked near Angel One in the Gray Butte hangar was the third of three MQ-9 Predator Bs that GA-ASI has modified for ballistic missile defense testing. Under a contract with the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, the manufacturer supplied two MQ-9 Block 1 aircraft that fed missile tracking data to the destroyer-based Aegis ballistic missile defense system during the biennial Pacific Dragon exercise off Kauai, Hawaii, in June 2016.

GA-ASI planned to begin functional flight testing soon of the third MQ-9. The upgraded Block 5 model is fitted with the Raytheon Multi-spectral Targeting Systems-C (MTS-C) electro-optical infrared turret modified by sister company, General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems, for the missile tracking mission. Separately, GA-ASI is developing a high-energy laser system at White Sands Missile Range that the Predator C would carry to intercept missiles, executives said.

Another role GA-ASI is exploring would see the MQ-9B Sea Guardian participate in manned-unmanned teaming with the Boeing P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft to expand the latter’s antisubmarine warfare capability. With 40 hours of endurance, the manufacturer argues, the Sea Guardian could provide persistent monitoring of a sonobuoy field and relay signals from the sensors to a ground station or another aircraft. This would complement, not compete against, Northrop Grumman’s MQ-4C Triton unmanned aircraft, which serves more of a force protection function in coordination with the Poseidon, GA-ASI says.

GA-ASI completed a manned flight-test of a sonobuoy receive system using a King Air twin turboprop this summer; it planned to test the system on an MQ-9 Block 5 aircraft by the end of the year.