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Contracts - Awards

Brazil orders C4ISR system for marines | Saab targets Gripen C/D sales in Europe & Africa | China tests new missile in response to THAAD

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Americas * The US Navy has awarded Rolls Royce a $78.7 million contract to provide logistical and engineering support for originally manufactured engines on the KC-130J tanker aircraft. Under the contract, aircraft in use by the US Marine Corp as well as the government of Kuwait will be affected. The work will primarily be completed […]
Americas

* The US Navy has awarded Rolls Royce a $78.7 million contract to provide logistical and engineering support for originally manufactured engines on the KC-130J tanker aircraft. Under the contract, aircraft in use by the US Marine Corp as well as the government of Kuwait will be affected. The work will primarily be completed in Indianapolis, with smaller contracts spread through other states, as well as Japan and Kuwait. The project is expected to be completed by May 2022.

* Elbit Systems has received a contract from the Brazilian marine corps to provide the service with an advanced C4ISR electronic warfare and communications system. Valued at $40 million, the C4ISR has Battle Management Systems application, C41 systems for artillery units, and advance EW capabilities. It can be mounted on vehicles such as tanks and armored personnel vehicles, and is integrated with command centers. The procurement of the system comes as the Brazilian marine corp transition to the doctrine of Network Centric Warfare—a high-technology concept that integrates command-and-control, logistics, targeting and navigational information, and communications into one system. Work on the contract will be performed over the next two years.

Middle East & North Africa

* Turkey’s Undersecretary for Defence Industries (SSM) has signed a deal with the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex (PAC) for the supply and deliver of 52 Super Mushshak trainers to the Turkish armed forces. The deal was one of three bilateral defense agreements signed between Turkay and Pakistan with the second being a letter-of-intent (LoI) for the sale of four MILGEM corvettes for the Pakistan Navy and the third a LoI for fresh collaboration between PAC and Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI). The contracts were inked on the second day of this year’s IDEF 2017 exhibition in Istanbul.

Europe

* Sweden’s Saab is looking to finalize a number of near-term sales of the C and D variants of its JAS-39 Gripen fighter. Upcoming competitions in Botswana, Slovakia, and Bulgaria, have all been targeted as potential clients for the C/D models, which if agreements are reached, will boost sales and ensure the continuation of the Gripen’s production line into the future. Of the three countries, Bulgaria is the closest to moving forward with a deal, after its government announced Saab as the preferred option for its MiG-29 replacement program. Slovakia have been in negotiations with Saab since 2015, while in Botswana, a Gripen package is facing off against an offering from Korea Aerospace Industries’ (KAI) FA-50—the fighter version of its T-50 trainer.

* Leonardo and the UK government have reached an agreement to develop the next generation of decoy counter-measures for fighter aircraft. The firm will partner with the British Royal Air Force’s Rapid Capability Office—an office created to bring new technologies to UK warfighters—and will use Leonardo’s BriteCloud EAD technology for the development of new expendable active decoys. BriteCloud is a second-generation, radar jamming decoy that uses enhanced on-board jamming techniques. It can be deployed from a standard chaff and flare dispenser, and draws an incoming missile away from the targeted aircraft.

* In a world first, Airbus has successfully completed the first test of its automatic air-to-air refueling (AAR) contact system. During the flight, the company’s A330 MRTT demonstrator was successfully steered into the receptacle of a Portuguese air force F-16 using image processing software that the company has been developing for more than a year. As many as six contacts were made over a 75 minute period, at 25,000 feet and 270 knots. The AAR system requires no additional equipment on the receiver and could be introduced on current production A330MRTTs as soon as 2019.

Asia Pacific

* Amid rising tensions and sabre-rattling in the region, China has announced that it has successfully tested a new missile, launching it into the waters of the Bohoi Gulf, near the Korean peninsula. While the Ministry of National Defense did not mention the new missile by name, analysts believe that it could be the DF-26—an intermediate missile capable of sinking warships, including US aircraft carriers. The test comes a month after Beijing said that is would respond to the deployment of the US THAAD system in South Korea by continuing to test new types of weapons under conditions simulating actual combat. China’s opposition to THAAD comes from the allegation that its radars are capable of peering deep into China, allowing the US and its allies to better detect rocket launches and aircraft movements.

* Israel Weapon Industries and Indian private sector firm Punj Lloyd have began a venture to jointly produce a variety of small arms from the Israeli firearm manufacturer’s product line, of which some are for use by Indian armed forces. Known as Punj Lloyd Raksha Systems (PLR), the new venture is the first private manufacturer of small arms in India that produces equipment for both use by the Indian defense forces and for export, and is expected to take a sizeable portion of India’s $5 billion small firearms market. IWI-designed weapons to be manufactured at the plant include the Tavor carbine, X95 assault rifle, the Galil sniper rifle, and Negev light machine gun. The foundation of the venture also comes as New Delhi faces an immediate requirement for 66,000 assault rifles, with a total requirement is 250,000, and it’s expected that in the next two months, an assault rifle tender worth an estimated $1 billion will be released by the Indian Army.

Today’s Video

* The US receives its G/ATOR:

https://youtu.be/rKkIGZs5va8 

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