Bell Textron and Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) have signed a memorandum of understanding to study a version of the MV-75 Cheyenne II tiltrotor for the Republic of Korea’s High Speed Medium Utility Helicopter (HSMUH) program.
The agreement, signed in Fort Worth, Texas, is the first publicly disclosed international cooperation tied to Bell’s MV-75 since the US Army formally named the platform Cheyenne II earlier in April 2026.
Bell said the cooperation is “aligned with US Government priorities and policies,” signaling the work will need to fit inside whatever export framework Washington eventually authorizes for the next-generation tiltrotor.
What the MOU covers
Under the agreement, Bell and KAI will assess MV-75-based solutions for HSMUH, including a modular open systems approach (MOSA) intended to enable the Republic of Korea (ROK) armed forces to modify the weapons system over time without relying on a single supplier. The two companies will also explore opportunities for industrial cooperation in South Korea as the work matures, although neither side outlined a workshare split, schedule, or financial terms.
“MV-75 represents the next generation of vertical lift,” said Jeff Schloesser, Bell’s Senior Vice President for Strategic Pursuits, framing HSMUH as an opportunity to extend the platform’s reach to US allies and partners.
The Republic of Korea has historically tied indigenous helicopter development to foreign technology transfer, most notably through KAI’s KUH-1 Surion utility helicopter, co-developed with Airbus Helicopters, and the Light Armed Helicopter (LAH) derived from the Airbus H155. A more modular architecture would, in principle, give Seoul broader flexibility to integrate domestic mission systems, sensors, and weapons.
South Korea’s hunt for a Black Hawk successor
The HSMUH program is part of a wider effort by Seoul to replace its Sikorsky UH-60P Black Hawk fleet, which numbers around 103 aircraft in Republic of Korea Army (ROKA) service, alongside HH-60P Pave Hawks operated by the Republic of Korea Air Force (ROKAF) and the ROK Navy.
South Korea launched a separate $715 million performance-improvement program in September 2025 to digitize and life-extend roughly 30 to 36 of those airframes for special operations and combat search-and-rescue use, with deliveries starting in 2029. Korean Air’s Aerospace Division was selected as the preferred bidder for that effort in April 2025.
The HSMUH effort, which KAI has previously discussed publicly under the High-Speed eXperimental Utility Helicopter (HSXUH) label, is positioned as the longer-term solution. Earlier KAI presentations associated the program with a 5,000-pound-class airframe.
The partnership with Bell suggests Seoul is now also looking seriously at heavier, faster solutions in the same class as the US Army’s MV-75, with an expected maximum takeoff weight of around 30,000 pounds.
A first international pitch for the MV-75
For Bell, the MOU is an early move to position the MV-75 as an exportable platform well before the US Army fields its own first aircraft. The MV-75, derived from the V-280 Valor demonstrator, is designed to cruise at around 300 knots and carry up to 14 troops and four crew, with a combat radius roughly double that of the Black Hawk it is replacing.
Bell won the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) contract in December 2022 with an initial $1.3 billion development award, beating the Sikorsky-Boeing SB-1 Defiant compound helicopter.
The first MV-75 is expected to enter service with the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, around 2030, with limited user testing planned for 2027 and 2028. The aircraft was officially named Cheyenne II on April 15, 2026, in a nod to the Northern Cheyenne Tribe of Montana, the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma, and to the canceled Lockheed AH-56 Cheyenne of the late 1960s.
Recent program milestones include the start of ground testing of Rolls-Royce’s AE 1107F engine in December 2025 and the award of contracts to Collins Aerospace in April 2026 for five onboard systems.
The Korean MOU is supported by the US Army Contracting Command at Redstone Arsenal under the same FLRAA development contract that funds the domestic program. That structure ties exploratory export work directly to the US Army’s program of record and underscores how tightly any future MV-75 sale to Seoul would be coupled with US policy decisions on technology release.
