23 janvier 2023 | Local, Aérospatial
Parliamentary budget officer to examine Liberal government decision to buy F-35
PBO Yves Giroux sent a letter to Defence Minister Anita Anand on Jan. 16 outlining the data he is requesting from her department.
1 décembre 2017 | Local, Naval
Chantier Davie won’t take ‘no’ for an answer
By Kevin Dougherty. Published on Dec 1, 2017 10:46am
QUEBEC – Chantier Davie in Lévis, across the St. Lawrence from Quebec City, will be forced to lay off 800 shipyard workers before Christmas without a new contract to build a second supply vessel for the Canadian navy.
“We're not taking no for an answer on that,” Davie CEO Alex Vicefield said in a telephone interview on Thursday, after Defence Minister Harjit Singh Sajjan told Le Journal de Québec last week through his press attaché that the government does not plan to buy a second supply ship.
In an email response Thursday, Sajjan's press attaché Bryne Furlong reiterated that, “Navy and Coast Guard supply requirements have been extensively studied and are subject to long-term planning, which does not include a second supply vessel.”
The layoffs have begun, now that the Davie workforce has completed — on time and on budget — conversion of the German-built container ship Asterix into a supply ship to deliver fuel, water, food and supplies to the ships of the Royal Canadian Navy.
Davie's plan now is the $600 million conversion of the Obelix, a sister ship to the Asterix, into the navy's second supply ship. Vicefield said Ottawa's plan calls for paying $2 billion each for two new supply vessels, the first of which will only be available 10 years from now.
“Why do we need to build these ships for $2 billion each?” Vicefield asked, noting the Asterix and Obelix cost $600 million each and are superior vessels.
“I'm not a political activist but we believe in the project and we delivered,” Vicefield said.
In 2011, the Harper government unveiled its National Shipbuilding Procurement Program, awarding $38-billion in contracts to build ships for the Navy and Coast Guard to Irving Shipbuilding Inc. of Halifax and Seaspan Shipbuilding of Vancouver.
Davie, emerging from bankruptcy at the time, is Canada's largest shipyard and was excluded.
Cost estimates have risen since then, Vicefield noted, with the cost ballooning to over $100 billion. And in the six years since the plan was announced, the two winning shipyards have delivered no ships.
Officially, Seaspan is to launch its first replacement supply ship in 2021.
But Vicefield noted that Andy Smith, the official responsible for shipbuilding in the federal department of fisheries and oceans, told a Commons committee Nov. 7 that Seaspan has a backlog of three ships to build before work on the first supply ship can begin in 2023, for delivery in 2027.
Vicefield said that in spite of granting the lion's share of shipbuilding contracts to Halifax, the Conservatives where shut out in Atlantic Canada in the 2015 election, and Steven Blaney, the Conservative MP representing Lévis, was re-elected even though Davie was excluded from the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy.
“The key point here is that shipbuilding contracts do not win votes,” Vicefield said. “But major procurement scandals bring down governments.
“If I was in government, I would be worried about a major procurement scandal, where you are spending five, six times the cost to buy a ship than any other country in the world pays and nothing is being delivered.”
The Asterix is also a hospital ship and can deliver humanitarian aid in the event of major natural disasters, such as a tsunami or a devastating hurricane.
Davie stepped into the breach in 2014, when the navy's two existing supply ships were scrapped and plans by Seaspan to build two replacement supply ships were a distant prospect.
The Harper government granted Davie a contract to convert the Asterix into a supply ship for about $600 million as a private-public partnership, with Davie managing the project from stem to stern, its financing, as well as providing its civilian crew and leasing the ship to the federal government for five years.
When Justin Trudeau led his Liberals to power in 2015, Irving Shipbuilding leaned on Liberal ministers from the Maritimes to have the contract cancelled.
But the work was underway and Ottawa did not block the Asterix project.
The Halifax-based and crewed Asterix will supply Canadian navy ships off the east coast, while off the west coast Canadian naval vessels will be supplied by Chilean and Spanish navy supply ships.
“Why would you do that when you can put the money back into Canada and ensure the jobs of 800 people here for another two years?” Vicefield said. “It makes no sense.”
Vicefield regards the Harper government's plans, renamed by the Liberal government as the National Shipbuilding Strategy, as “mind-boggling” and “a bit of a joke.”
And he believes Canada can have three shipyards, including Davie, to build and maintain naval and Coast Guard vessels.
“There are about 50 large ships that need replacing,” he said, noting the average age of the Coast Guard fleet is 40 years. “So there is enough work for sure for three shipyards for the next 30 years.”
“We haven't been pushing against the National Shipbuilding Strategy,” Vicefield said. “I think it is going to fall on its own.”
Irving, which is now building ships in Romania, and Seaspan, which has ordered two ferries to be built in Turkey, are defending the plan, and so far have political support.
“They see the writing on the wall,” Vicefield said. “They want to destroy the competition. They see that now they have the upper hand.
“But we're not going to let that happen,” he insists.
“We're convinced the new government, the Liberals, will actually see sense.
“But it is taking time for them to get their feet under the desk.”
https://ipolitics.ca/article/chantier-davie-wont-take-no-answer/
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2 avril 2019 | Local, Sécurité
Thales Completes Acquisition Of Gemalto To Become A Global Leader In Digital Identity And Security
Thales (Euronext Paris: HO) has today completed the acquisition of Gemalto (Euronext Amsterdam and Paris: GTO), creating a global leader in digital identity and security. With Gemalto, Thales will cover the entire critical decision chain in a digital world, from data generation via sensors, to real-time decision support. This acquisition increases Thales's revenues to €19 billion and self-funded R&D to €1 billion a year, with 80,000 employees in 68 countries. PARIS — Completed in 15 months, the acquisition of Gemalto by Thales for €4.8 billion creates a Group on a new scale and a global leader in digital identity and security employing 80,000 people. The larger Thales will master all the technologies underpinning the critical decision chain for companies, organisations and governments. Incorporating the talent and technologies of Gemalto, Thales will develop secure solutions to address the major challenges faced by our societies, such as unmanned air traffic management, data and network cybersecurity, airport security or financial transaction security. Thales completes acquisition of Gemalto to become a global leader in digital security This combination creates a world-class leader with an unrivalled portfolio of digital identity and security solutions based on technologies such as biometry, data protection, and, more broadly, cybersecurity. Thales will thus provide a seamless response to customers, including critical infrastructure providers such as banks, telecom operators, government agencies, utilities and other industries as they step up to the challenges of identifying people and objects and keeping data secure. Research and development: inventing the world of tomorrow Thales and Gemalto share a passion for the advanced technologies that serve as a common foundation and focus for their 80,000 employees. Research and development (R&D) is at the core of the new Group, with its 3,000 researchers and 28,000 engineers dedicated to R&D. Thales has been developing state-of-the-art technologies to meet the most demanding requirements of customers around the world for decades. Today the Group has become a giant laboratory inventing the world of tomorrow, with a portfolio of 20,500 patents, of which more than 400 new ones were registered in 2018. Technological synergies The new Thales will cover the entire critical decision chain in an increasingly interconnected and vulnerable world, with capabilities spanning software development, data processing, real-time decision support, connectivity and end-to-end network management. With €1 billion a year devoted to self-funded R&D, the Group will continue to innovate in its key markets, drawing in particular on its world-class digital expertise in the Internet of Things, Big Data, artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. The first illustrations are as wide as the Group's portfolio: Banking: Big Data analytics Defence: biometrics Aerospace: unmanned traffic management Ground transportation: Internet of Things Space: Internet of Things Telecommunications: Big Data analytics An extended global footprint Following this acquisition, Gemalto will form one of Thales's seven global divisions, to be named Digital Identity and Security (DIS). Gemalto will interact with all of the Group's civil and defence customers and will significantly strengthen its industrial presence in 68 countries. Thales will considerably expand its operations in Latin America (2,500 employees, up from 600), triple its presence in Northern Asia (1,980, from 700), Southeast Asia (2,500, from 800) and India (1,150, from 400) and North America (6,660 employees, up from 4,600). “With Gemalto, a global leader in digital identification and data protection, Thales has acquired a set of highly complementary technologies and competencies with applications in all of our five vertical markets, which are now redefined as aerospace; space; ground transportation; digital identity and security; and defence and security. These are the smart technologies that help people make the best choices at every decisive moment. The acquisition is a turning point for the Group's 80,000 employees. Together, we are creating a giant in digital identity and security with the capabilities to compete in the big leagues worldwide.” Patrice Caine, Chairman and CEO, Thales About Thales The people who make the world go round – they rely on Thales. Our customers come to us with big ambitions: to make life better, to keep us safer. Combining a unique diversity of expertise, talents and cultures, our architects design and deliver extraordinary high technology solutions. Solutions that make tomorrow possible, today. From the bottom of the oceans to the depths of space and cyberspace, we help our customers think smarter and act faster – mastering ever greater complexity at every decisive moment along the way. Thales generated revenues of €19 billion in 2018 with 80,000 employees in 68 countries. https://montrealgazette.com/pmn/press-releases-pmn/business-wire-news-releases-pmn/thales-completes-acquisition-of-gemalto-to-become-a-global-leader-in-digital-identity-and-security/
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5 juin 2024 | Local, Terrestre
Liberal government increases secrecy over multibillion-dollar defence purchases
Documents about the F-35 fighter jet and the Canadian Surface Combatant project released three years after Access to Information request.