Originally, SAAB had contracted with Thales for its AESA antenna to be integrated with the Gripen NG, and while this will happen, Thales is refusing to make this available for production variants, because they are heavily tied into the Dassault Rafale, so far winless in export competitions, and the Gripen is competing against it for the Indian MMRCA and the Brazilian fighter competition.

This is further complicated by the fact that while the Thales system is compatible with the existing signal processor from the Saab PS-05 MSA radar already flying on the JAS-39 C, some of the successors would likely require that that this be changed, increasing integration costs.

So SAAB is casting about for another radar, hopefully one that is US content free, so as to avoid US export restrictions.