NEW DELHI — India has started price negotiations with France’s Dassault Aviation on the 126-fighter Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) program. A contract is expected to be signed after six months, Indian Defense Minister A.K. Antony says. India announced early February that the French Rafale had won the $11 billion deal, beating the Eurofighter Typhoon on price.
SINGAPORE — Raytheon is starting discussions with international customers about the possible purchase of the Griffin missile, although export approval remains to be secured. The program is now transitioning from its sole-U.S. focus to expanding the customer base, said Zack May, director of Air Warfare Systems business development at Raytheon, during the Singapore air show.
The nomination of Mark Lippert as assistant secretary of defense for Asia-Pacific security affairs, which was on hold for a nearly one year, is being further delayed in an attempt to bolster the Taiwanese air force. In a statement saying the White House has not yet addressed concerns about the aging of Taiwan’s fighter jet fleet, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) has placed a hold on the president’s nominee to lead the Pentagon’s policies in Asia.
LOS ANGELES — Following the termination of its long-running F136 alternative F-35 Joint Strike Fighter engine last year, General Electric is accelerating R&D efforts to support an installed base of 25,000 engines and provide new sixth-generation combat engines that it says will be needed sooner rather than later.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Feb. 23 - 24 — Fifth Society of Experimental Test Pilots' Annual Southeast Symposium, Ramada Plaza Beach Resort, Fort Walton Beach, Fla. For more information go to www.setp.org/table/southeast Feb. 23 - 24 — Air Force Association, Air Warfare Symposium, Rosen Shingle Creek, Orlando, Fla. For more information call (703) 247-5800 or go to www.afa.org/events
Click here to view the pdf Winners & Losers In the U.S. Army 2013 U.S. Budget Requests (Base Request + OCO, $ in thousands) Winners & Losers In the U.S. Army 2013 U.S.
HOUSTON – The International Space Station is in line for an artificial gravity inducing centrifuge for future research projects involving small biological and materials samples later this year, following a Feb. 14 hardware exchange between Astrium Space Transportation, the developer, and NanoRacks LLC, the equipment integrator.
SINGAPORE — Indonesia is planning to buy new radars that will be used for national defense and commercial air traffic management. Lockheed Martin is proposing its TPS-77 and FPS-117 surveillance radars. In an effort to boost its chances of securing the contract, Lockheed Martin has teamed with local, privately owned company PT CMI Teknologi.
WORKING ON IT: Touting its American bona fides and striving to appear responsive to its customers’ needs, Sierra Nevada said Feb. 15 it is “exploring ways” to mitigate expected delays in meeting the April 2013 delivery schedule for the first aircraft under the U.S. Air Force’s embattled Light Air Support (LAS) contract. Rival Hawker Beechcraft has mounted a legal and public relations campaign to undo the USAF award to Sierra and Embraer, whose work was stopped last month under a subsequent USAF order due to the litigation.
NEW DELHI – India’s largest company by market capitalization, Reliance Industries Ltd., and France’s Dassault Aviation have signed an initial pact to work together in the Indian defense and homeland security sector, a Reliance official says. The agreement comes less than two weeks after Dassault emerged as the lowest bidder for a multibillion-dollar order to supply 126 Rafale fighters to the Indian air force. Indian Defense Minister A. K. Antony said it was a long process and the deal was not expected to be signed in the current financial year.
Dallas – Boosted by military training contracts, light piston and turbine helicopter maker Enstrom is ramping up production as it looks to rack up back-to-back record years. “We are making a dent in the industry” says Jerry Mullins, president/CEO of the Michigan-based manufacturer. Although a relatively small player compared with other manufacturers competing in the training market, Enstrom is riding a building wave which shows signs of swelling throughout the business.
Washington – The budgets for at least three airborne directed energy weapons are being fully protected by the U.S. Air Force in fiscal 2013 budget plans, a top researcher says. Specifically, they are the platforms to carry high-power microwave warheads that are being developed in parallel. The longest range device is the Boeing-made Champ cruise missile.
SPAIN-BOUND SHIPS: The U.S. Navy has named the four Arleigh Burke class guided-missile destroyers to be forward deployed to Rota, Spain, including three from Norfolk, Va. – the USS Ross, the USS Donald Cook, and the USS Porter – as well as one from Mayport, Fla., the USS Carney. The ships will support President Barack Obama’s European Phased Adaptive Approach for ballistic missile defense to enhance the security of the European region. Ross and Donald Cook will arrive in fiscal 2014 and Carney and Porter in fiscal 2015.
Partisan posturing over how to avoid steep spending reductions at the Pentagon is in full swing, as Republicans try to pin blame on the Obama administration for not engaging fully on deficit reduction. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s weeklong series of hearings on Capitol Hill has given him a platform for pointing out that Congress passed the law that set those spending cuts in motion and that it is Congress’s responsibility to fix it.
A European research collaboration has developed the prototype for an augmented reality device that could move distant astronauts through a range of medical procedures for which they are not thoroughly trained, from diagnosing internal ailments with ultrasound to performing surgeries.
In observance of U.S. Presidents’ Day, Aerospace Daily & Defense Report will not publish an issue dated Feb. 21. The next issue will be dated Feb. 22. Aviation Week Intelligence Network subscribers may visit www.aviationweek.com/awin at any time for news updates.
ABOARD THE USS KEARSARGE — In his nonfiction book “Marine,” author Tom Clancy says, “Amphibious warfare is one of the most expensive and risky forms of combat ever devised. You have to move difficult and unruly cargo (combat troops) … and bring them through hostile waters to an enemy shore. You have to then deliver them, with all of their equipment and supplies, onto a beach.” After just a couple of days aboard the amphibious landing helicopter dock ship LHD-3 USS Kearsarge during a major coastal exercise, it’s easy to understand what Clancy means.
Rome and Ft. Worth, Texas – Italy has slashed its planned purchase of F-35 Joint Strike Fighters by 41 aircraft, Italian Defense Minister Giampaolo Di Paola says. The country will now buy 90 JSFs instead of 131. Italy will purchase both F-35A and F-35B variants and assign them to its navy and air force, replacing its AV-8B Harrier II, AMX, and Tornado fighter bomber.
Click here to view the pdf Winners & Losers In the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army 2013 U.S. Budget Requests (Base Request + OCO, $ in thousands) Winners & Losers In the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army 2013 U.S.
Among the Navy’s big aircraft procurement programs, the V-22 Osprey suffered the most severe cut of all in the Obama administration’s 2013 budget proposal, worse than the F-35C carrier variant. Funding across the Future Years Defense Program hovers around $1.5 billion each year for a total of $6.2 billion. Against the 42% cut, an increase in the program’s advance procurement plan is trivial.
Even after reports about new problems with Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, lawmakers are looking for reassurance from the Pentagon brass of a continued commitment to the military’s largest weapons program.
PARIS — Two of Europe’s biggest International Space Station contributors have rejected a NASA proposal that would see the European Space Agency (ESA) pay its share of ISS operating costs by building a propulsion module for NASA’s Orion crew transport capsule, saying the proposal is technologically lackluster and unlikely to generate public enthusiasm.
HOUSTON — President Obama’s proposed 2013 NASA budget of $17.771 billion, just $59 million below this year’s spending plan, has many at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston relieved they were spared deep cuts. Yet there is a simmering concern of an imbalance between investments in commercial crew systems intended to ferry astronauts to low Earth orbit and the agency’s own Orion/Space Launch System for future deep-space destinations.
SINGAPORE — Pratt & Whitney warns of mounting difficulties in its effort to control costs on some of its key military engine programs because of reductions in annual purchases of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter’s F135 engine and other powerplants. “As volumes reduce, it becomes more of a challenge” to reduce costs, says Pratt & Whitney Military Engines President Bennett Crosswell. However, he adds, so far the “need to reduce volumes has not resulted in increased cost.”
