Paris - Systems company Thales is working as part of an industrial group to win a maintenance contract for the avionics on board the French Air Force's C-160 Transall tactical transport planes, said Pierre-Eric Pommellet, the head of the company's aerospace division.
The company has worked with the Ministry of Defense and the French Air Force "to put on the table" availability contracts, as part of the service's plan to extend the life of the C-160, he told journalists. No financial details were available.
Separately, Saudi Arabia has asked Thales to provide equipment for an EADS CASA C-295 maritime patrol aircraft, Pommellet said. The equipment would include radar, optronics and communications.
Airbus Military, the EADS division that builds the C-295, declined to comment on the Saudi Arabian requirement.
The C-160 avionics contract is part of the Explorer program, managed by the French Air Force's SIMMAD logistics arm, said a spokeswoman for the Direction Générale pour l'Armement (DGA), the French government's arms procurement office. The program is intended to extend the C-160's service life to 2018. The DGA launched the competition last year and expects to award the contract by the end of this year, the spokeswoman said.
The French Air Force had wanted to acquire a fleet of 12 to 15 Lockheed Martin C-130J airlifters as an interim solution while waiting for delivery of the four-engine A4000M transport plane, which is expected to be several years late in entering operational service. Airbus Military is the prime contractor for the A400M.
The French government, however, decided to "focus on the Transall C-160," Pommellet said.
Thales and Sabena Technics hold a contract to upgrade cockpit avionics in the Air Force's existing squadron of C-130H Hercules transports.
Thales is competing for the Explorer contract as part of the OEM Defence Services joint venture, which comprises Thales, Safran, Zodiac, Diehl and Liebherr. Among them, the companies claim they can deliver a unified supply chain for the C-160 and maintain its equipment, including electronics, countermeasures, hydraulics, tires, undercarriage and auxiliary power units.
Lessons learned from maintaining the Transalls would be useful in proposals for similar service offers for the French military's Tiger and NH90 helicopters and the A400M, Pommellet said.
The Air Force operates about 50 Transalls, of which about 20 are of the C-160R or new-generation type. These were upgraded in 1994 with new avionics and an air-to-air refueling capability, an Air Force spokesman said. The older aircraft are 40 years old and carry a lot of flying hours, he said.
In the global market for maritime patrol aircraft, Thales sees the Falcon jet as a "very efficient platform for surveillance," Pommellet said. Dassault Aviation, which owns 26 percent of Thales, builds the Falcon, which is designed as a business jet.
Regarding medium altitude long endurance (MALE) drones, Britain and France have held high-level talks on cooperation on a common UAV program, Pommellet said. "We take it very seriously, given our industrial position."
French officials are keen to draw on lessons learned from operating the interim tactical and MALE UAVs deployed in Afghanistan, and they will feed that information into decisions on a future MALE procurement.
Thales expects an order from the French government "in the weeks to come" on tranche four of the Rafale strike fighter, which will allow full series production of the combat jet's active electronically scanned array radar, Pommellet said. That will give a boost to the Rafale's export prospects, he added.
On the A400M transport plane, Airbus told a recent suppliers' conference that it is negotiating not just for itself but also for the suppliers, which are risk-sharing partners and have not been paid, as the A400M program is running two years behind schedule.
Pommellet said he did not expect more financial provisions on the A400M. So far, Thales has booked 162 million euros ($239.6 million) in charges on the program.
Thales, which supplies most of the A400M's electronics, including its flight management system, delivered to Airbus Military its revised schedule for deliveries earlier this year. The information allowed Airbus Military to negotiate with the client a new timetable and terms for the program, which had to be renegotiated due to the two-year delay.
The client is OCCAR, the European arms contracting agency, which represents the seven European governments that are partners on the A400M program. They include Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Spain and Turkey.
This year, defense activities have generated some 60 percent of sales for Thales' aerospace division, with civil aviation making up 40 percent of the division's sales. Military spending in Britain and France has held up so far, and that has provided financial stability in the face of difficulties in the commercial aerospace market, according to Pommellet,
The Army's Future Combat Systems (FCS) program is ready to test a few components that soldiers may have in their hands by 2010.
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