Indian Military

India has settled on the GE-414 engine to power the indigenous Tejas Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Mk-2. The Price Negotiating Committee for the Alternate Engine of the LCA Mk-2 issued a statement on Thursday, saying that it had finalized the Comparative Statement of Tenders. “After evaluation and acceptance of the Technical offer provided by both Eurojet and GE Aviation, the commercial quotes were compared in detail and GE Aviation was declared as the lowest bidder,” said the statement.

The statement was issued two days after Defense Minister Arackaparambil Kurian Antony’s visit to the United State, where he held meetings with US Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee Admiral Mike Mullen. It also came on a fairly heavy news day, with the country’s complete attention focused on a verdict of the Allahabad High Court on the highly contentious issue of the disputed ownership of a property where a mosque was demolished in 1992, itself alleged to have been been built on the site of the birthplace of the Hindu God Ram.

India’s air show in Bangalore next week will be the largest ever with 29 countries bringing their aerospace products, including fighter jets and transport aircraft, for showcasing at the five-day event.

The biennial Aero India 2011 will for the first time witness the civil aviation sector overtaking military aviation. The air show will see 54 percent of the aircraft, helicopters and aerospace systems from the civilian sector compared to 46 percent from the military sector.

“This year’s air show will surpass all previous figures in terms of participating countries, companies, space and business. All inputs show a healthy growth than the previous edition of Aero India. Civil aviation sector at 54 percent will overtake military aviation content at 46 percent in this year’s show,” Secretary of Defense Production Raj Kumar Singh told reporters here on Tuesday.

To be held at the Yelahanka Air Force Station, this year’s show has been oversubscribed in terms of exhibition space and the Defense Exhibition Organization has had to refuse further bookings, he said.

New Delhi — The prestigious $10.2 billion contract to sell India 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) will undoubtedly heat up during the forthcoming Aero-India Show 2011 in Bangalore. The main contenders for the MMRCA race will be highlighting the salient features of their aircraft in full-flight displays at the show during the second week of February.

While the main MMRCA contenders have confirmed their participation at the Aero-India show, only the Russian MiG-35 which is in the MMRCA race will not be showcasing its fighter craft. The Indian defence ministry is currently persuading the Russian contender to make its presence felt at the airshow. While the MiG-35 may not make it to the airshow, a Russian delegation is surely expected in India for Aero-India 2011.

The other five contenders for the MMRCA include Boeing’s F/A-18 Super Hornet, Lockheed Martin’s F-16 Super Viper, Eurofighter’s Typhoon, Dassault Aviation’s Rafale and Saab’s Gripen. Barring Russia, each contender is bringing in two to three aircraft along with elaborate teams and flight simulators for displays since India will make a choice in July this year.

New Delhi — The Aero-India 2011 has broken a record of sorts with its current edition of the air show that is taking place at the Yelahanka Air Force Base in Bangalore. Deemed as the biggest air show in India and Asia, the Aero-India 2011 has broken all records in terms of the turnout of international firms, spectators and content. In fact, for some of the international vendors, Aero-India 2011 is bigger in some respect to the Paris Air Show or Central Europe Air Shows.

As per the figures given by the Department of Defence Production (DDP), the online request for registration of general visitors to the air show this year has already exceeded the 175, 000 which is more than twice than the Aero-India 2009. This year, the organisers have increased the gross area to 75,000 square metres which is a 70 percent increase from the last Aero-India in 2009. The international exhibits have also risen from 380 against 303 in the last edition, indicating a 25 per cent hike in the international section.

Switzerland is again in the market for fighter aircraft after having announced a postponement of a decision, last year, to purchase the replacements for their F-5 Tiger aircraft.

Significantly, not only is the Swiss Air Force looking for additional capabilities in the aircraft, like an AESA radar, it is also planning to increase the order size from 22 to 36. This would result in an increase in the value of the order from the USD 3-5 billion estimated last year.

Switzerland was considering the Swedish SAAB’s Gripen, EADS’ Eurofighter and the French Dassault’s Rafale to replace their F-5 aircraft, before it put the tender process on hold last year, ostensibly for budgetary reasons.

But the Swiss are now looking at other options as well and have invited Boeing to offer the F/A-18 Super Hornet. This could partly be a result of a feeling that they might be able to achieve cost savings, keeping in mind the existing infrastructure for the upgraded F-18 Hornets, which they already operate.

Less than a month before the expiry of the commercial bids for the Indian Air Force (IAF) order for 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA), the Ministry of Defense has asked the six vendors to resubmit their proposals for technical offsets. Earlier this week, the ministry sent letters to the MMRCA-6, asking them to send in their revised bids within ten days.

The terms of the estimated USD 10 billion-tender mandate the winning vendor to plow back 50 per cent of the value of the order into India. The vendors had submitted their original offset proposals in July 2008, but it was only last year, after the IAF submitted its report on the flight evaluation of the six aircraft, that the ministry began work on the offset evaluation in earnest. It found the offset proposals submitted by all six vendors to be unsatisfactory and after repeated rescheduling of deadlines for the submission of revised offset proposals, has finally asked the vendors to send in their plans by the middle of next week.

The Indian Ministry of Defense has issued letters, on Wednesday, to two of the six vendors competing in the estimated USD 10 billion Indian Air Force (IAF) tender for 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA), asking them to extend the validity of their commercial bids, which will expire on Thursday, tomorrow.

StratPost can confirm that the European Eurofighter Typhoon consortium and the French Dassault’s Rafale have been invited to do so, effectively making up the shortlist.

StratPost can also confirm that according to the IAF and the ministry, the other aircraft in the fray, the US Boeing’s F/A-18 Super Hornet, the US Lockheed Martin Corporation’s F-16, the Russian MiG-35 and the Swedish SAAB’s Gripen did not pass the technical evaluation conducted by the IAF.

It is noteworthy that this comes just a day before the commercial bids of all six vendors were to expire.

It would not be unsurprising if this move by the ministry and it’s coincidentally sharp timing were to raise the hackles of the spurned vendors.

The Indian Ministry of Defense has asked the European Eurofighter Typhoon consortium and the French Dassault to extend the validity of their commercial bids for the Indian Air Force (IAF) tender for 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tender till December 31, 2011.

StratPost reported the formation of an effective shortlist for the tender, on Wednesday, with the ministry issuing letters to the two aircraft companies, inviting them to extend the validity of their commercial bids.

The other contenders for the order, Boeing, pitching its F/A-18 Super Hornet, Lockheed Martin, with its F-16, SAAB, with its Gripen and the Russian United Aircraft Corporation (UAC), offering its MiG-35, were also sent letters informing them of the individual grounds for their failing to pass the IAF’s technical evaluation.

More later.

The spurned vendors and countries failing to receive invitations by the Indian Ministry of Defense to extend the validity of their commercial bids for the Indian Air Force (IAF) tender for 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA), which expired on Thursday, have issued cautious responses indicating that they do not consider the matter closed and that there is, still, much left to be discussed.

As first reported by StratPost, the the European Eurofighter consortium and the French Dassault’s Rafale were the only two companies issued invitations by the ministry to extend their bids up to December 31, 2011, for which they have been given two weeks. The other four vendors in the race, US companies Boeing and Lockheed Martin, Swedish aircraft manufacturer SAAB and Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation were not extended similar invitations, thereby leading to a shortlist by default.

Their respective aircraft, the F/A-18 Super Hornet, the F-16, the Gripen and the MiG-35 were found to have failed to pass muster in the technical evaluation conducted by the IAF.

India has asked two European defense firms shortlisted for its $10.4 billion tender for 126 combat jets to extend their commercial bids till December 31 and has given them two weeks time to do so, an official said Thursday.

The Indian Air Force (IAF), for whom the 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) are being bought to replace its aging Soviet-era MiG-21 fighters, has conveyed to European consortium EADS Cassidian and French firm Dassault to extend their commercial bids that were to expire Thursday, the defense ministry official said.

EADS is offering the Eurofighter Typhoon and Dassault the Rafale.

India has also conveyed to the other four contenders for the contract, described as the “mother of all defense deals”, that they were out of the race, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

American Boeing’s F/A-18 and Lockheed Martin’s F-16, Russian United Aircraft Corporation’s MiG-35 and Swedish SAAB’s Gripen were the firms whose bids were rejected and it was conveyed to them that their aircraft did not clear the flight and weapons evaluation trials completed in April 2010 on 643 parameters.