MOSCOW, December 22. /TASS/. The flight tests of Russia’s A-100 Premier advanced aircraft radar are planned to start in 2017, United Instrument-Making Corporation CEO Alexander Yakunin told TASS on Thursday.

The Premier systems are currently being tested with the help of a flying laboratory created on the basis of the A-50 aircraft. The laboratory took to the skies for the first time this year, he said.

"Now checks of the electromagnetic compatibility of all the systems are underway along with the work to test protocols and regimes of information exchange and solve other design tasks. This is invaluable information, which helps maximally prepare the first A-100 serial-produced plane based on the Ilyushin Il-76MD-90A aircraft for flight tests, which are planned to begin next year," the CEO said.

According to the chief executive, this will be an absolutely new set of radar surveillance and observation with a considerably larger number of monitoring systems.

"A new computer center of incoming information processing has been established for this purpose along with operators’ new automated workplaces. The A-100 will be two or three times more powerful by its characteristics, including the target detection range, than its predecessor [A-50]," Yakunin said.

The A-100 is the next generation of long-range radar detection and control aircraft, which are employed to spot and track aerial targets and surface ships and inform command posts of automated control systems about the aerial and maritime situation. They can also be used for control of fighter jets and attack aircraft to aim them towards aerial, ground and sea targets and serve as an airborne command post.