Russian army to get new version of Pantsir-S1 air defense missile system Pantsir-SM 2904142.

“The modernization of the serial Pantsir-S1 systems with new missiles is underway now, and we expect to get them by the end of the year. It will be a new upgraded version of the serial system,” said Colonel Yuri Muravkin.

“The dimensions of the missile will be altered slightly but it will fit in as usual and no changes will be required. The missile is undergoing preliminary tests now,” Muravkin said.

In a firing exercise at the Ashuluk Range, Pantsir-S1 systems engaged targets imitating high-precision weapons. “While before we engaged low-speed targets, today we are trying to hit targets that are moving at a speed of 1,000 meters per second,” he added.

Yuri Savenkov, First Deputy Executive Director of the Tula-based KBP Instrument Design Bureau, which designs the Pantsir systems, said the high-speed missile for the system had been used during the tests at Ashuluk for the first time.

Manufacturers will start supplying the new Pantsir-SM air defense system to the Russian army in 2017, Dmitry Konoplev, KBP Instrument Design Bureau Managing Director, said earlier.

“We are now working to create a totally new system, Pantsir-SM. I think we will get it ready by 2017. It will have new characteristics much better than the present ones,” he said.

Konoplev also said that an upgraded version of Pantsir-S1 would be handed over to the Defense Ministry in late 2015.

A sea-based version of the system is also being developed. The first three Russian warships will be armed with it after 2016.

The Pantsir-S1 system designed for air defense of small military and administrative-industrial objects and areas against aircrafts, helicopters, cruise missiles and high-precision weapons, guided air bombs and unmanned aerial vehicles as well as for reinforcement of AD groups during repulse of massive air strikes and ensuring of engagement of lightly-armored targets.