28 juillet 2020 | International, Aérospatial
Dassault Aviation CEO Eric Trappier hinted at a new Rafale jet export contract in the making while speaking at his company's first half 2020 financial results conference in Paris earlier this week.
“A potential new Rafale export contract is postponed,” he said while referring to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Dassault's performance without naming the country with whom his company was close to signing the contract with.
This is the first official acknowledgement by Dassault Aviation of a new Rafale export order reaching the contract stage- the first since deals were struck with Egypt, Qatar and India starting 2015.
Reports of India being in talks to buy an additional 36 Rafale aircraft have been going on for a while now, but nothing has been revealed officially as yet.
In addition, Dassault Aviation is in talks with UAE and Malaysia. It is in competition to sell jets to Switzerland and Finland pitted against European rivals Eurofighter and Saab.
Of these prospects, India appears as the most likely candidate even as the first five Rafale jets arrive in India Monday.
Earlier this year, comments by the Indian Chief of Defence Staff, Gen Bipin Rawat that a potential order for 114 jets would be “staggered” set off speculation of an additional order for Rafale fighters.
A staggered purchase (of the Rafales) would ease financial burden by paying for the jets as they are manufactured. In addition, buying additional Rafales would ensure that the jets keep getting supplied to India uninterrupted beyond the end of the first contract for 36 jets.
Several Indian media reports said that French aircraft manufacturer Dassault and India's HAL are in talks for possible cooperation in producing Rafale fighter jets in India for additional anticipated orders under a staggered procurement plan. The Economic Times reported in February this year that a few rounds of discussions have taken place between the two companies on possible work share for additional orders of the Rafale.
In this context ‘work share' could mean local assembly of either the aircraft or some major components. It could also mean installation of some Indian components in the jet. Dassault and HAL are already implementing a contract to modernize India's Mirage-2000 jets.
Additional Rafales could be cheaper than the 36 ordered in 2016 for Euro 7.8 billion. Of the total cost, Euro 195 million was spent on India-specific enhancements which will come down as the majority of the cost was for R & D, modification and certification. Besides, India had paid for setting up two bases for just 36 aircraft. These bases can easily accommodate more jets.
1 février 2022 | International, Aérospatial
Boeing and the Air Force say the new version of the KC-46's Remote Vision System remains on schedule, despite lingering problems still being worked out.
6 juillet 2020 | International, Aérospatial, C4ISR
Air & Cosmos consacre un article aux performances du nouveau radar à balayage électronique Captor E-Scan. Airbus Defence and Space a récemment remporté un contrat pour le développement, la fourniture et l'intégration de 115 radars Eurofighter E-Scan destinés à la flotte allemande et espagnole d'Eurofighter. Ce radar, opérant en bande X, améliore « la portée efficaces des missiles air-air de l'avion et permet une détection et un suivi plus rapides et précis de plusieurs aéronefs en même temps », rappelle le magazine. « Le contrat pour le radar Captor E-Scan est une réalisation majeure pour équiper l'Eurofighter de capteurs qui assurent aujourd'hui la domination de l'avion », a déclaré Dirk Hoke, CEO d'Airbus Defence and Space. Air & Cosmos du 3 juillet
26 octobre 2018 | International, C4ISR
By: Jessie Bur The Pentagon and General Services Administration released a request for information Oct. 25 for a new unified collaborative cloud solution that will unite the entire defense apparatus under one enterprise contract. The Defense Enterprise Office Solution is the first capability set of three that the Department of Defense plans to use to capture its enterprise collaboration and productivity needs. The DEOS capability set needs include a productivity suite, messaging capabilities, content management systems and collaboration tools. “We operate pretty much in a disparate environment right now, and predominantly on-[premises] for these capabilities. So DEOS will give us an opportunity to tear down some of those barriers, posture us for increased interoperability while taking advantage of what the commercial community has to offer,” said Essye Miller, principal deputy to the DoD chief information officer, at a press roundtable. “From a benefit perspective, for us: real-time upgrades, real-time refresh, real-time access to innovation as our industry partners make them available to us.” The contract will be offered through GSA's IT Schedule 70, which Miller said has matured to the level that was needed to support Non-Classified Internet Protocol Router, Secret Internet Protocol Router and tactical environment needs. “In fact, IT Schedule 70 is the vehicle GSA itself used to procure its own cloud-based email, collaboration and productivity solution,” said GSA Administrator Emily Murphy, adding that GSA is committed to working with vendors who would want to propose through the expedited Schedule 70 FASt Lane program. “Using IT Schedule 70 to help DoD procure an enterprisewide solution for email, productivity and collaboration tools could establish a baseline for GSA to scale up this type of solution across the federal government in the future.” In fact, according to Federal CIO Suzette Kent, the DoD solution moves the federal government forward on initiatives to use and procure scalable cloud solutions across agencies. “When we look at where we were with the report to the president across the federal government, and the intent to leverage as many common solutions for purposes of interoperability, cybersecurity ... and the overall efficiency of how we go after those solutions and the ability to keep those current, this is a really positive collaboration, and something that we're incredibly supportive of,” said Kent. Industry has just over two weeks to respond to the RFI, which closes Nov. 9, and the subsequent request for quotes will likely be released in early 2019, according to officials. The DoD and General Services Administration also plan to hold industry days in early December 2018 to facilitate communication between government and industry on the best way to approach the contract. The award for the eventual contract is planned for sometime in the third quarter of 2019, and would likely be set for approximately 10 years and $8 billion, according to Murphy, though that number could change depending on industry input. The appropriate solution would likely have to be certified at FedRAMP Moderate, said Miller. According to Murphy, GSA and DoD have yet to determine whether a single-award or multi-award contract will best suit the DoD's needs — a debate that proved highly contentious for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure cloud contract that opened for proposals July 26 — and the RFI asks respondents to provide pros and cons for each option. But DoD CIO Dana Deasy said that the DEOS program is part of a Pentagon initiative to bring defense operations into a multi-cloud and multi-vendor environment. “Our intentions are to have a cloud that can serve general purpose computing needs, as well as what I have coined a term as ‘fit-for-purpose' clouds, which could consist of internal clouds or commercial clouds that have a unique fit for purpose,” said Deasy, adding that DEOS would be one such cloud. Because DEOS is one of three collaboration capability sets the agency is looking to fulfill, DoD could end up offering a total of three contracts in that space, according to Miller. https://www.federaltimes.com/acquisition/2018/10/25/dod-seeks-industry-input-on-multibillion-dollar-cloud-collaboration-solution