Infantry-21: Switzerland’s IMESS
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A number of countries are currently developing “future soldier” kits that attempt to give soldiers the same kind of advanced technologies now going into vehicles, aircraft, et. al., including wearable computers, helmet displays, and more. As currently conceived, the wisdom and long-term effectiveness of many of these programs is a matter of debate that will only be resolved by performance in combat situations.
The IMESS effort may have an unfortunate acronym in English, but it sits firmly in the mainstream of these programs. The framework contract includes a first development phase, plus options for series productions worth more than EUR 120 million. A prototype phase will be finalized in September 2008, followed by an optional industrialization phase in 2009, and optional series production phases in 2010 and 2014, according to Swiss procurement bills RP 09 and RP 13. The optional phases are all subject to approval by the Swiss Parliament.
The Swiss project’s vendors are also mainstream…
Contracts & Key Events
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Nov 23/07: EADS Defence & Security, through its integrated Business Unit Defence & Communications Systems (DCS), has been awarded has been awarded an exclusive contract with armasuisse, the Procurement, Technology and Real Estate Center of the Swiss Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport (DDPS), for the prototype phase of IMESS, the future soldier modernisation program, with options for a subsequent industrialisation and first series delivery. EADS DCS will be the prime contractor, while and Sagem Défense Sécurité from SAFRAN Group will be the main subcontractor.
EADS DS is the prime contractor for the German Bundeswehr’s Infanterist Der Zukunft (IdZ) program, which has also been evaluated by Sweden under the MARKUS program. They have also been contracted to develop the Spanish Combatiente Futuro (COMFUT) equivalent. Sagem Défense Sécurité has just delivered the FELIN future soldier system (Fantassin à Equipements et Liaisons Intégrées) to the French Army in October 2007 for technical/operational tests, and will deliver another batch of FELIN systems in 2008.
With firms like Rheinmetall (Canada, France, Germany), Thales (UK, Germany), Selex (Italy, UK), and General Dynamics (USA) positioning themselves in this field, EADS and SAGEM hope that they will be able to leverage their combined wins (Germany, France, Spain) into further wins in Europe and beyond. EADS release | SAGEM release.
Additional Readings
- DID – Europe’s 21st Century Infantry Programs. Updated.
