December 9, 2019 | International, Aerospace
By: Sebastian Sprenger
COLOGNE, Germany – German defense officials are negotiating with contractors Lockheed Martin and MBDA Deutschland about a bid proposal for a next-generation antimissile program that the government believes is missing crucial components, according to a new defense ministry report.
Information about the status of the high-profile TLVS program, short for Taktisches Luftverteidigungssystem, is included in the latest, unclassified portion of a biannual assessment by the defense ministry on the progress of key military acquisition programs.
The document constitutes the defense ministry's first public evaluation of the U.S.-German industry consortium's second and final bid, submitted in June.
“The analysis of the second offer shows that the proposal still falls short of the government's requirements because key elements and services were not included, some of which had been previously agreed,” the document states. Additionally, some performance requirements, which are left unexplained in the report, were not addressed in the industry bid, it adds.
Talks with the companies are ongoing to clarify outstanding issues by the end of 2019, the defense ministry wrote.
Overall, the government considers the program to be “fragile” based on a high degree of technological and managerial complexity. That is compared to a more upbeat assessment in the previous report, dated June, which found “significant progress” had been made over the previous six months.
The defense ministry did not respond to a request for comment on what elements the Lockheed Martin-MBDA proposal was lacking. A Lockheed spokesman referred questions to the German government, writing in an email, “It is a matter for the German MoD to comment on the content of its latest project report and position relating to TLVS.”
The report offers an explanation for why defense officials have been unable to articulate a time table for submitting the multibillion-dollar program to the German parliament for consideration.
For one, the government must first wait for a foreign military sales process to play out with the United States over access to key performance data of the Lockheed-made PAC-3 MSE interceptor, the primary missile of the TLVS system. Germany launched the petition for the requisite goods and services in April 2019.
In addition, officials are unable to formulate a path for integrating a secondary interceptor into the system, the IRIS-T SL, to be made by Germany's Diehl Defence, officials wrote. That is because the most recent Lockheed-MBDA proposal lacks the detailed interface documentation that would be needed to integrate such an interceptor into TLVS. Without that information, however, officials are unable to solicit a bid from Diehl, according to the report.
German officials consider the ability to use IRIS-T missile a must-have for TLVS because those missiles are domestically made and because they are cheaper.
Amid the runaway program complexity giving officials headaches, the government still appears to believe in the promise of the TLVS system as a replacement of the country's fleet of Patriot batteries. If it can be made to work, the military expects a “technological advantage” that will position the country as a NATO leader in missile defense, the report states.
Officials will make decisions about the way ahead after ongoing talks with industry come to an end, it adds.
November 28, 2023 | International, Security
Israeli defence electronics firm Elbit Systems said on Tuesday it had boosted supplies to Israel's military due to the country's war with Hamas militants, as it reported higher quarterly profit.
June 10, 2020 | International, Aerospace
Afin de soutenir les entreprises aéronautiques, le gouvernement anticipe des commandes d'avions, d'hélicoptères et de drones militaires pour les armées et les forces intérieures, pour un montant de 832 millions d'euros. La ministre des Armées, Florence Parly, a annoncé l'acquisition de trois avions ravitailleurs A330-MRTT, d'un avion de surveillance et de renseignement, de huit hélicoptères de transport militaire Caracal et de drones de surveillance navale, ce qui représente « une charge de travail de 1 200 emplois sur trois ans». «La commande de trois nouveaux MRTT à livrer en 2021 et 2022 au lieu de 2027 et 2028 est très importante. Elle va nourrir la chaîne de fabrication des A330 à un moment critique, alors que la crise pèse davantage sur les gros-porteurs A330 et A350 », explique Antoine Bouvier, directeur de la stratégie chez Airbus. La sécurité civile et la gendarmerie ont également concentré leurs commandes sur les nouveaux modèles d'hélicoptères afin d'appuyer leur commercialisation. La Sécurité civile commande ainsi deux hélicoptères H145 de nouvelle génération (5 pales), dont la certification est en cours, tandis que la gendarmerie commande 10 H160 pour 200 millions d'euros. En développement depuis près d'une décennie, le nouvel H160, présenté pour la première fois dans sa version militaire au Bourget en juin dernier , attend de manière imminente sa certification européenne. La ministre des Armées a également indiqué que de nouveaux engagements sur la commande d'avions de combat Rafale de Dassault Aviation pourraient être examinés. Ensemble de la presse du 10 juin
May 31, 2019 | International, Aerospace
By: Sebastian Sprenger MADRID — Spanish defense companies are chomping at the bit to get into the business of building Europe's next-generation combat aircraft, just as the government is about to formally enter the Franco-German project. While the extent of the Spanish industry participation in the Future Combat Air System program is still an open question, some of the companies at the inaugural FEINDEF defense expo in Madrid, Spain, are beginning to jockey for position. Brig Gen. Juan Pablo Sanchez de Lara, chief of the Spanish Air Force's plans division, told reporters at the expo that industrial cooperation is “essential for us.” “We are not new in the business,” he said. “Of course Spanish companies are very keen to participate.” Airbus, for example, which is already a prime contractor besides Dassault from France, is looking to bring into play its local work with the Spanish Air Force for the cockpit design of the future fighter aircraft. The Spanish air service presented an Airbus-made cockpit prototype — part futuristic lab, part test bed for additional design work — at its booth, pitching it as a contender for the FCAS program. The setup features a large, panoramic screen similar to that in the F-35, sprinkling in some traditional controls beside the pilot. Officials said the cockpit is the result of previous concept work, concluding that fusing information and commanding nearby drones, for example, are key requirements. Tests are ongoing based on operational vignettes crafted by the Air Force to see how pilots handle workload, stress and the torrent of information thrown at them during flight. When the first FCAS aircraft takes to the skies around 2040, “the scenarios will be more complex,” Ignacio de Castro Vidal, Airbus Defence and Space future capabilities program manager at the defense giant's Madrid location, predicted in an interview with Defense News. That is a reference to the expectation that warfare itself will be more complicated, but it's also an acknowledgment that the program is designed with so much networked technology that the task of flying the aircraft must be kept manageable. To increase the ease of use for pilots, the company plans to lean heavily on voice commands to operate the aircraft's systems, de Castro Vidal said. Spanish electronics specialist Indra is also eyeing work on elements of the next-gen fighter aircraft. “Indra is the second provider of avionic systems for the Eurofighter,” Pedro Barco, the company's director of platforms, wrote in a statement to Defense News. “The experience gained in this project allows us to play a key role as integrator of the system of systems for the FCAS. “In particular, we have a strong experience in electronic warfare systems, voice and data communications, and radar detection and identification systems.” Eurofighter Typhoon-maker Airbus has pitched upgraded versions of that jet as a gap filler until the new aircraft is developed and built, saying that the planned upgrades would serve as something of a sandbox to try new air warfare concepts. Spain and Germany fly that aircraft, while France has the Rafale. As for engines, ITP Aero, based north of Madrid, hopes to share development work with France's Safran and Germany's MTU. “ITP is looking forward to the next step of the program, and we want to be a part of it from the beginning,” Marta Gimeno Garcia-Andrade, director of the company's defense business unit, told Defense News. She said a key area of expertise for ITP Aero lies in low-pressure turbines and movable, “thrust-vectoring” nozzles. Several Spanish defense executives at the FEINDEF expo said expect Spain's formal integration into FCAS to take place at the Paris Air Show in mid-June. Officials in Germany, however, said earlier this week the exact sequence of extending the program's framework agreement to include Madrid was still in flux. That is because the German parliament has yet to greenlight funding for an ongoing study contract and because legal issues with the agreement text may not be fully sorted out in time. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2019/05/30/spanish-defense-contractors-are-itching-to-get-a-piece-of-fcas/