Individual Carbine

The Individual Carbine was a competition to select the planned successor to the M4 carbine in the United States Army.

The U.S. Army conducted an open competition for a carbine to replace the M4. This competition was for the Army only—the United States Marine Corps and other branches chose to stay with current weapons in service. The proposal was passed before the Joint Requirements Oversight Council in August 2010, and the Army was to solicit submissions from the small arms industry by the end of that year. The competition was open to all manufacturers. However, Phase II testing reduced the field down to six rifles. The competition was intended to provide an evaluation of the full range of weapons available. Presolicitation notice W15QKN-11-R-F003 was posted January 31, 2011.

Complete results of the competition and selection of a new carbine were expected before FY 2013. However, the competition was cancelled in June 2013.

The Individual Carbine was to provide accurate and reliable firepower. It had to be capable of semi-automatic and full-automatic fire. Integrated rails were to accept MIL-STD-1913 Picatinny rail-mounted accessories. It had to be fully ambidextrous. While the caliber for any new weapon was open for the competition, any contributions not of 5.56×45mm NATO and/or 7.62×51mm NATO had the burden of test ammunition and extra costs placed on the competitor. The draft asked for a non-developmental weapon. Rather than working with the Army to develop a new weapon, competitors were to bring forward designs they already had available.

Weapons submitted included the XCR by Robinson Armament Co., an off-the-shelf or derivative of the M6A4 by LWRC, the ACR by Remington, the SR-16 by Knight's Armament Company, the FN SCAR by FN Herstal, the CM901 by Colt's Manufacturing Company, and the HK416 by Heckler & Koch. A draft request for proposal (RfP) was issued in late 2010 followed by an industry day. The finalized RfP was issued in second quarter FY 2011 to which industry had a month to respond. A 12–18-month testing phase commenced and over 1 million rounds were to be fired. Testers looked at the consistency in accuracy of the carbines as they aged. Costs were also be considered. The Office of the Secretary of Defense monitored tests and the evaluation and there was congressional oversight to ensure the competition was full and open. US$30 million was spent on testing. The winner of the competition had to be a "measurable improvement" over the M4 carbine to replace it; otherwise, the program would instead convert all M4 carbines to the enhanced version. The winner of the competition would sell the rights to their weapon to the military and choose two other competing suppliers to help manufacture it.

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