Swedish jet maker complains about Ottawa negotiating to buy F-35

On the same subject

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  April 22, 2020 | Local, Aerospace

  COVID-19 latest hurdle in Canada's long road to buying new fighter jets

  OTTAWA — COVID-19 is presenting another challenge to Canada's long-running and tumultuous effort to buy new fighter jets. The federal government last summer launched a long-awaited competition to replace the Royal Canadian Air Force's aging CF-18s with 88 new fighter jets at an estimated cost of $19 billion. The move followed a decade of controversy and mismanagement by various governments. The three companies still in the running are supposed to submit their bids at the end of June and, despite the pandemic, the federal procurement department insisted in an email to The Canadian Press that it still expects them to meet that deadline. The three companies vying for the lucrative contract are Lockheed Martin and Boeing from the U.S. and Sweden's Saab. Lockheed Martin builds the F-35 while Boeing is pitching its Super Hornet and Saab is offering its Gripen jet. Yet while representatives for the three companies say they are likewise plugging away at their respective proposals, a senior Boeing executive left the door open to asking the government for an extension as COVID-19 forces the company to adjust how it does business. "It's challenging, there's no question about it," Jim Barnes, the Boeing executive responsible for trying to sell the company's Super Hornet jet to Canada, said in an interview on Tuesday. "We want to make sure we put the most competitive offer on the table for the government of Canada to evaluate and we feel like we can put a very compelling offer. If we feel like we don't have time to finalize that competitive offer ... we would certainly ask for an extension." The government has already approved one extension to the competition since it was launched last July. Companies were supposed to submit their final bids at the end of March, but were given three more months after Saab asked for more time. Boeing continues to work closely with the U.S. government and navy on its bid and hopes to meet the current deadline, but Barnes said the pandemic has slowed things down as many staff work from home on a complex project with significant security considerations. "Then you have to take into consideration the health of your subject-matter experts in those areas where there are just a few people that can really work up those responses," he said. "Those kinds of things we're dealing with. I'm not sure if the other teams are dealing with that, but we are monitoring that and if we feel like we can't meet the deadline, we'll certainly consider an extension request as an option." Representatives for Lockheed Martin and Saab were more confident in being able to meet the current deadline. "Lockheed Martin remains prepared to provide a comprehensive proposal for Canada's future fighter capability project competition," Lockheed Martin Canada chief executive Lorraine Ben said in a statement. "We have not requested an extension of delivery for the FFCP preliminary proposal and we are excited to share more about the F-35's ability to strengthen and modernize defence, enhance ally partnerships and contribute to economic growth in Canada." Saab Canada president Simon Carroll expressed similar sentiments, saying in an interview that while there some challenges in preparing a bid during a pandemic, "we're certainly working towards that and are planning at this point in time to submit in accordance with that deadline." Yet there are also questions about the government's ability to move ahead on the project even if the companies do get their bids in on time, given the majority of federal employees are working at home. "Those submissions are going to have a combination of sensitive and classified information, and handling all that with a workforce, the majority of which is working from home, is going to be more difficult," said defence analyst David Perry of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. "I think as a basic bottom line, it is completely illogical to think that the impacts of COVID-19 won't be running through the entire suite of defence procurements because you can't work as efficiently with a huge chunk of your workforce at home." This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 21, 2020. https://www.richmond-news.com/covid-19-latest-hurdle-in-canada-s-long-road-to-buying-new-fighter-jets-1.24121637

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  November 30, 2018 | Local, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Why can't Ottawa get military procurement right?

  Murray Brewster · CBC News The last couple of weeks may go down in the Trudeau government's public record as the point when the desires of deliverology met the drawbacks of defence procurement. Remember 'deliverology'? That lofty concept — measuring a government's progress in delivering on its promises — was the vogue in policy circles at the beginning of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's administration. While it's sometimes derided as an empty concept, deliverology must have seemed tailor-made for a new government inheriting a troubled defence procurement system. The Canadian International Trade Tribunal's decision Tuesday to step into the brawl over which multinational consortium will design and support the construction of the navy's new frigates is another lesson in how (apologies to Robert Burns) the best laid plans of mice and men go awry. The tribunal's decision to order Ottawa to put the frigate project on hold pending the completion of their probe into a complaint by a failed bidder comes at a politically awkward time for the Liberals. One week ago, Auditor General Michael Ferguson delivered an ugly report on the Liberals' handling of fighter jet procurement — specifically, the plan to buy interim warplanes to cover the gap until the current CF-18 fleet can be replaced with new aircraft. Self-inflicted wounds A cynic's reflex (given the checkered history of defence purchasing over the last decade) might be to consider these two events as just another day at the office for the troubled government procurement system. That might not be entirely fair. Still, experts were saying Wednesday that the government is suffering from numerous self-inflicted political and administrative wounds on this file. With a federal election on the horizon, and in a climate of growing geopolitical instability, the question of what the government has actually managed to deliver on military procurement is an important one to ask, said Rob Huebert, an analyst in strategic studies at the University of Calgary. While the system, as the Trudeau Liberals and previous governments have constructed it, seems to be the perfect model of the "evidence based" policy making promised by the champions of deliverology, it's also not built for speed. Some would suggest the deliverology model was followed to the letter in the design competition now tied up before the trade tribunal and in Federal Court. What seemed like endless consultations with the bidders took two years. The government made up to 88 amendments to the tender. And in the end, the preferred bid was challenged by a competitor that claims not all of the navy's criteria were met. Alion Science and Technology Corp. and its subsidiary, Alion Canada, argue the warship Lockheed Martin Canada and BAE System Inc. want to sell to Ottawa cannot meet the speed requirements set by the tender without a substantial overhaul. It does not, the company claims, meet the government's demand for a proven, largely off-the-shelf design. Michael Armstrong, who teaches at Brock University and holds a doctorate in management science, said the government could have avoided the challenges and accompanying slowdowns had it been more precise in its language. "They could have been more clear and firm when they use the words 'proven design'," he said. "Did they literally mean we won't buy ships unless they're floating in the water? Or did they mean that British one that doesn't quite exist yet is close enough? "If they would have been more firm and said, 'We want a ship that actually exists,' that might have simplified things at this stage." Huebert described the auditor general's report on the purchase of interim fighters as an all-out assault on evidence-based policy making. "It is just so damning," he said. A break with reality The Conservatives have accused the Liberals of avoiding the purchase of the F-35 stealth jet through manufacturing a crisis by claiming the air force doesn't have enough fighters to meet its international commitments. The auditor found that the military could not meet the government's new policy commitment and even ignored advice that one of its proposed solutions — buying brand-new Super Hornets to fill the capability gap —would actually make their problems worse, not better. That statement, said Huebert, suggested a jaw-dropping break with reality on the government's part. "They [the Liberals] were just making things up," he said. It might have been too optimistic to expect the Liberals to fix the system, said Armstrong, given the short four years between elections. But Huebert said Ottawa can't carry on with business as usual — that the government now must deliver on procurement, instead of doubling down on rhetoric. The problem, he said, is that governments haven't really paid a price in the past for botched military procurement projects. There was "no political pain for the agony of the Sea King replacement, as an example," he said, referring to the two-decade long process to retire the air force's maritime helicopters. "The thing that makes me so concerned, even outraged, is that we are heading into a so much more dangerous international environment," said Huebert, citing last weekend's clash between Russia and Ukraine over the Kerch Strait and ongoing tension with Beijing in the South China Sea. "When things get nasty, we have to be ready." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/why-can-t-ottawa-get-military-procurement-right-1.4924800

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  June 18, 2019 | Local, Aerospace

  Will the request for bids for new Canadian fighter jets be released next month?

  DAVID PUGLIESE Federal officials are hoping to get out the request for proposals on the Canada's future fighter jet procurement project by mid-July. That will mean that any changes have to be done and the process signed off in the coming weeks. At the same time a federal election is expected by October and should take place on or before October 21. Can federal bureaucrats make the mid-July deadline? “There's always risk to it,” said Pat Finn, Assistant Deputy Minister for Materiel at the Department of National Defence. “We recognize the closer we get to a writ period the more there is an issue there. So we're just making sure we're driving hard to get it out by mid-July.” At this point four aircraft are expected to be considered: two U.S.-built aircraft, the F-35, and the Super Hornet, and two European planes, the Eurofighter Typhoon and the Gripen. The winning bidder will build 88 jets for Canada, and the first delivery is expected in the mid-2020s with the full capability available in the early 2030s, according to documents produced by the Department of National Defence. https://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/defence-watch/will-the-request-for-bids-for-new-canadian-fighter-jets-be-released-next-month