Advertise with us
Where the defense community gets down to business.
Show Coverage
Looking for more? Check out this year's full list of upcoming show coverage.
Conferences
View exclusive coverage of the best minds in Defense - military, government and industry.
RIO DE JANIERO - South Africa's Denel is developing a fifth-generation air-to-air missile with the Brazilian defense industry in what is a model for defense technology transfer between countries, a Denel executive said at a seminar for visitors at the Latin America Aerospace and Defense (LAAD) conference.
Denel Dynamics, a division of Denel, is developing the short- to medium-range A-Darter missile that can be used on the Gripen fighters South Africa is receiving from Saab and on Brazil's F-5 aircraft. It also could be used on whichever fighter Brazil procures in its FX-2 fighter competition, said Col. Ian van Vuuren, director for the A-Darter program at Denel Dynamics.
Van Vuuren gave a basic "how-to" seminar on establishing a framework for technology transfers between countries.
"One of the typical problems with technology transfer is everybody agrees to do it, [but] it takes two and a half years for the client receiving the technology to put the establishment team in place in his own country," van Vuuren said. In that time, knowledge is lost and training loses its effectiveness.
How to establish an effective framework is "not that obvious when you're in a middle of a program, having to launch it, apply the funding, find the people, put the mechanisms in place," he said.
Van Vuuren's presentation focused on the process Denel and the governments of South Africa and Brazil used to establish a framework for the technology transfer as part of the A-Darter program. Key to the process is having over-arching government support, formalized in cooperation agreements, and creating a joint contracting body to award the contract to companies. With restrictions on advanced missile technology from developed countries, it's hard for non-aligned countries to equip their aircraft, van Vuuren said.
Production of the first A-Darter missiles is planned for 2011, with one or all of Brazilian companies Avibras, Opto Electronica and Mectron producing a portion of the missiles.
Help
