29 novembre 2021 | Local, Aérospatial
FFCP declines Boeing’s Super Hornet bid in future fighter competition - Skies Mag
The federal government has told Boeing that its bid for Canada’s Future Fighter Capability Project did not meet its requirements.
28 novembre 2018 | Local, Naval
Tribunal orders feds to postpone contract in $60B warship project
The Canadian Press, Lee Berthiaume
OTTAWA — The $60-billion effort to build new warships for Canada's navy is facing another delay after a trade tribunal ordered the federal government to postpone a final contract for the vessels' design.
The federal government announced last month that U.S. defence giant Lockheed Martin beat out two rivals in the long and extremely sensitive competition to design replacements for the navy's frigates and destroyers.
Lockheed's design was based on a brand-new class of frigates for the British navy called the Type 26. The company is now negotiating a final contract with the government and Halifax-based Irving Shipbuilding, which will build the ships.
But one of the other two bidders, Alion Science and Technology of Virginia, has asked the Canadian International Trade Tribunal and the Federal Court to quash the government's decision.
It says Lockheed's design did not meet the navy's stated requirements and should have been disqualified. Two of those requirements related to the ship's speed, Alion alleged, while the third related to the number of crew berths
Late Tuesday, the tribunal released a one-page statement ordering the government to “postpone the awarding of any contract ... until the Tribunal determines the validity of the herein complaint.”
Alion has argued that the rules of the competition required the federal procurement department and Irving, which helped evaluate the bids, to reject Lockheed's bid because of its non-compliance. Instead, they selected it as the preferred design.
The company also maintains that its own proposed design, which is based on a Dutch frigate, met the navy's requirements. It has said that it has received no information about why Lockheed's bid was selected over its own, despite requests for answers.
Lockheed Martin and Public Services and Procurement Canada declined to comment because the matter is before the tribunal and federal court. The third company in the competition, Spanish firm Navantia, has remained largely silent on Lockheed's successful bid.
The government is planning to build 15 new warships starting in the next three or four years, which will replace Canada's aging Halifax-class frigates and retired Iroquois-class destroyers. They're to be the navy's backbone for most of the century.
The bid by Lockheed, which also builds the F-35 stealth fighter and other military equipment, was contentious from the moment the design competition was launched in October 2016.
The federal government had originally said it wanted a “mature design” for its new warship fleet, which was widely interpreted as meaning a vessel that has already been built and used by another navy.
But the first Type 26 frigates are only now being built by the British government and the design has not yet been tested in full operation.
There were also complaints from industry that the deck was stacked in the Type 26's favour because of Irving's connections with British shipbuilder BAE, which originally designed the Type 26 and partnered with Lockheed to offer the ship to Canada.
Irving also worked with BAE in 2016 on an ultimately unsuccessful bid to maintain the Canadian navy's new Arctic patrol vessels and supply ships.
Irving and the federal government have repeatedly rejected such complaints, saying they conducted numerous consultations with industry and used a variety of firewalls and safeguards to ensure the choice was completely fair.
But industry insiders had long warned that Lockheed's selection as the top bidder, combined with numerous changes to the requirements and competition terms after it was launched — including a number of deadline extensions — would spark lawsuits.
Government officials acknowledged last month the threat of legal action, which has become a favourite tactic for companies that lose defence contracts, but expressed confidence that they would be able to defend against such an attack.
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6 avril 2022 | Local, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
Des achats coûteux pour mettre l’armée à niveau
Après des années de sous-financement, le Canada devra assumer une très longue et coûteuse liste d’épicerie pour mettre sa défense à niveau.
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20 août 2019 | Local, Aérospatial
Smol: Why Sweden is leagues ahead of Canada on fighter-jet technology
With the election looming, the Liberal government has set in motion, at least on paper, its commitment to consider bids for the purchase of new fighter jets. Of course, how committed the government is to move ahead on its renewed commitment remains to be seen. Meanwhile, any Canadian truly committed to seeing a modern, well-equipped RCAF, supported by a capable military procurement program, should take special note of one of the top contenders to replace Canada's aging fleet of fighters: Sweden. This non-aligned country, approximately the size of Newfoundland and Labrador, with a population only slightly larger than that of Quebec, has not only succeeded in developing generations of fighter jets, but has seen impressive success in exporting them. Apart from Sweden, Saab's JAS 39 Gripen, the latest version released in 2016, is being used by the Czech Republic and Hungary within NATO. The governments of Brazil, South Africa and Thailand are also purchasing the aircraft. Other countries such as India, Botswana, Indonesia and the Philippines are seriously considering the Gripen. But instead of fretting about how much Canada's aging fighters stand to potentially be outdone by the air forces of the developing world, we should instead look squarely at how Sweden came to be a serious contender to arm and equip this country's emaciated airforce. We should instead look squarely at how Sweden came to be a serious contender to arm and equip this country's emaciated airforce. The answer lies in the national mindset of the two countries. Unlike Canada, and especially when it comes to defence, Sweden refuses to allow itself to fall into dependency status vis-à-vis Europe, NATO or any other military power. In other words, while they actively cooperate with NATO in the defence of Europe, they make it clear that the defence of Sweden is first and foremost a Swedish responsibility. It is why the Swedish army, navy and airforce use high-tech equipment, much of which is built by the Swedes themselves. It is why the Swedes supplement their advanced military technology with elaborate defence-in-depth war plans and civil defence policies. The manual, “If crisis or war comes,” has been recently mailed to every household in Sweden. By contrast, we Canadians have chosen a quasi-colonial mindset with respect to our defence, clearly reflected in our epically embarrassing procurement shortcomings and failures. For the last 60 years, beginning with the cancellation of the Avro Arrow, Canada has been falling into a pattern of dependency on the United States on all matters related to defence. Sweden, on the other hand, has remained committed to designing and developing much its own military aircraft, ships, submarines and army equipment. In the mid-1950s, both Canada and Sweden were working independently on their own advanced fighter aircraft. While Canada was working on the Arrow, the Swedish military and engineers were hard at work on the Draken, which came out the same year. The Draken had a similar delta wing design to the Arrow and was the first European-built fighter jet to break the sound barrier. But that is where the comparison ends; the two countries went on very different paths with respect to their airforces. Canada cancelled and destroyed its Arrow aircraft and took on second-rate Voodoo fighters from the United States. It is what we Canadians wanted, as no successive Conservative or Liberal government has since tried to “bring back the Arrow.” Sweden aggressively continued development of new fighter technology, replacing the Draken with the Viggen in the 1970s, while Canada continued to try to squeeze more life out of our then-aging fighter jets. In the 1980s, as Canada was finally taking on the U.S built F-18, Sweden was working on the first version of the modern Gripen. Of course, as had been well documented, the early Gripen had problems. But as with the Draken and Viggen, the Swedes, unlike Canada, stayed with their national fighter jet. Today, Canada can only dream what our military aircraft industry might have been like in 2019 if then-prime minister John Diefenbaker, with the tacit support of the opposition Liberals, had not cancelled the Arrow, accelerating our descent into military dependency on the United States and national impotence on military procurement. https://ottawacitizen.com/opinion/columnists/smol-why-sweden-is-leagues-ahead-of-canada-on-fighter-jet-technology