Dassault Rafale, tender | News & Discussions

[sathya]

 

[StrikeForce]

MMRCA Winner to be announced by November as Defence Ministry Approves MMRCA Offset Proposals
Posted on: October 10, 2011

The Indian Air Force (IAF) Chief N.A.K Browne has announced that the winner of the $ 10.4 billion tender for 126 Medium Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) will be revealed by November this year. As for the Defence Ministry, it has approved the offset proposals for the MMRCA deal and paved the way for opening the commercial bids in ten day’s time. The Eurofighter Typhoon from EADS and Rafale from Dassault are the two contenders for MMRCA deal.

The offset proposals from Dassault Aviation (Rafale) and the Eurofighter consortium (Typhoon) have been presented before the DAC by Director General (Acquisition) Vivek Rae and the meet was attended by Defence Minister A.K. Anthony, the three Service Chiefs, the Defence Secretary and other concerned joint secretaries and defence officials. In the MMRCA deal, the lowest bidder who wins the deal will have to plough back 50 per cent of the worth of the deal in Indian defence industry. This implies that the winner of the MMRCA tender will invest over $ 5 billion as offsets into the Indian defence sector.

The two remaining MMRCA contenders are the French Rafale from Dassault Aviation and Eurofighter Typhoon from European conglomerate and their commercial bids will be opened before October end and the lowest bidder will be revealed by November. The Indian Air Chief Marshall added that after opening the bids, various calculations pertaining to the deal vis-a-vis the entire life-cycle cost, the acquisition cost and the technology transfer will be done. After the bids are opened to evaluate the lowest bidder, the proposal will move to the Finance Ministry for its approval. After the Finance Ministry, the proposal will move to the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) for final nod by the government.

Both the MMRCA contenders, the Eurofighter Typhoon and the Rafale are new state of art aircraft. While the Eurofighter has entered service with six air forces, Rafale has been in service with the French Air Force. The two planes had been shortlisted in middle of 2011 year after discarding other competitors including American Boeing's F/A-18, Lockheed Martin's F-16, Russian UAC's MiG-35 and Swedish Saab's Gripen after their trials and evaluations.

The tender for the 126 combat planes was issued in August 2007 and the finalization of this crucial tender comes after four years. The IAF is looking at inducting these aircraft from the beginning of 2015 but that may not be a possibility. Sources added that although India urgently needs more combat planes, the new planes are not likely to arrive by 2015. The MMRCA will be the mainstay of the IAF along with the indigenous LCA Tejas, Indo-Russian Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft and Su-30 MKI in the coming decades.

Source: MMRCA Winner to be announced by November as Defence Ministry Approves MMRCA Offset Proposals - Defence Now

 

[Storm Force]

IM telling you all RAFAEL is destined to become the next big fighter in the indian air force

you will all see by 30 November 2011

126 rafaels at $105 million each complete with TOT and enough weapons for 10 sorties each.

watch this space

 

[Taygibay]

RAFALE please, StrikeForce.

because Rafael is an Israëli company.

Rafale :

Rafael :

But otherwise agreed,

Good day all, Tay.

 

[SpArK]

Eurofighter deliveries to the Spanish Air Force, the Typhoon nr. 300!

Two Italian Air Force Typhoons flying over the Superga hill in Turin.

 

[Taygibay]

One French Rafale flying over the Libyan sands then,
somewhat more useful

Good day all, Tay.

 

[sancho]

One French Rafale flying over the Libyan sands then,
somewhat more useful

Good day all, Tay.

Good old times when Rafale didn't needed to strike Libya, but was even close to be procured by them. Times can change fast isn't?

 

[Black Widow]

I hope EFT bring down the price to make competition more interesting ..

 

[Taygibay]

Agreed sancho but it was never clear that Dassault favored that sale.
The government yes but considering the semi-derelict state of the
Libyan Air Force, aaaaaaaand, the new govt may get those at last.
But a good question might be whether they are really needed there

As for answering Black Widow, if lower price is computed with offsets,
then EF may already be the cheaper deal but since it was revealed that
the L1 offer could be neglected for strategic purposes ...............
we can just wait for the decision, still,

Good day all' Tay.

 

[westtowel]

I always thought EF is a better aircraft,but only rafales are deployed widely in Libya.

 

[Taygibay]

^^^^^^^^^
Take heart westtowel!

Even though a Rafale proponent myself, I can assure you
that the Typhoon is a very good fighter in its own right.
AND, it is present over Libya!

What favors the Rafale in that campaign is of time's nature.
The EF is in service with countries that are still using the
trusted high-low mix in their fighter fleets.
As such, development/integration of its capacities is a quite
complicated affair.
The UK seems to have the clearer timeschedule for it which
comes from their expectation to rely on a duo EF/F-35 soon.
But at the same time, the RAF uses it as an interceptor first
as the good ol' Tornados ( Gr 4 mostly ) can do bomb duties.
In varying degrees the same can be said of the other EF nations.

Let's remember that air dominance was central to the concept
and project that became the Typhoon whereas the Raffy was
intended as an omnirole machine from the start.
In this light, it is but normal that it reaches AtoG FOC first, see!

The EF is supposed to be as multirole as it is designed to be only
by 2015-18 as things stand and then mostly for Great Britain.
Now, right now, the Rafale is mature if not finished developing
in all capacities which is only normal.

Good day all, Tay.

 

[sancho]

I hope EFT bring down the price to make competition more interesting ..

I don't think the price is the real issue, IAF/MoD already had decided to go for the costliest 2 in the competition, but the point is what we get in return for the money. The EF consortium, which included big companies like EADS and BAE will most likely offer offsets to Indian industry than the Rafale Internation consortium might can. The same was reported from the Swiss competition and the recent reports about reducing the work in the UK, but offering to transfer these parts of the production to India could be hints on what they offer as well. It's simple outsourcing to reduce the production cost of the EF on the one side, but also a part of the share we get as a partner of the EF, so indeed an interesting point for Indian industry.
However, we are not at the begining of the EF production anymore, the 300th fighter was delivered now and we would be a part of the production line only beyond 2015 and since the initial partners will not order more EFs, our industry will mainly produce parts only for IAF and if new export customers decides to order EFs. That is basically the same that we might have on offer from the French as well, even if (it's at least not known yet) we have no simila offer to be a partner of the Rafale.
From the Brazilian competition it is known that if they select Rafale, the wings for all Rafales (Brazilian, French and other export versions) would be produced in Brazil. From the Swiss competition it is known that they also gets part of the production and also that their industry might be part of further developments for the Rafale, so we can expect similar offers to be made in the MMRCA and for Indian industry.
All this will be part of the cost-benefit analysis, with EF "possibly" as the more costly fighter for IAF/MoD, but also more industrial advantage on the other side and the improvement of the Indian industry has a very high importance in MMRCA as we all know (imo the sole reason why the MRCA was skipped and we went to MMRCA, by risking further shrinking of the squad numbers). That's why I keep saying, even if the Rafale is the clearly better and more suiting fighter from IAF/INs point of view, it might be not for MoD and the industry, that's why the EF has still all chances to win this competition and if the costs might be higher.

 

[Yeti]

EADS will benefit even if Eurofighter does not get picked, they are setting up a (R&D) centre in Bangalore.

 

[sancho]

Agreed sancho but it was never clear that Dassault favored that sale.
The government yes but considering the semi-derelict state of the
Libyan Air Force, aaaaaaaand, the new govt may get those at last.
But a good question might be whether they are really needed there

Exactly, which might be a reason why France/Dassault might offer UAEs Mirage 2000-9s instead, which still needs an export customer before the UAE will by Rafales right? Libya might get Rafales as a long term prospect and since they owe France a lot and might get be influenced by the UAE too, the chances for such a deal are not that low. Even the Qatari Mirage 2000-5s could end up in Libya, since they want to sell them and buy new fighters instead as well, but they have an international competition, not a single vendor deal like it is the case in the UAE.


@ westtowel

As Taygibay mentioned, the EF isn't a bad fighter, it has even the same potential to be a good multi role fighter in future, especially the EF 2020 version that is on offer for us, Japan or Turkey. The problem is, that it was designed less balanced like the Rafale, since the partners developed it as an air superiority fighter during the cold war times and with the aim of countering Russian Flankers. The multi role capabilities was planned to be added as secondary capabilities during the time, but with huge cost increaseings of the EF project, the economy/financial crisis and the fact that half of the partners also planned with the F35 in their fleet, they simply don't want to pay too much for the EF and it's upgrade anymore. The EF consortium is able to and even developed similar techs like the French does for Rafale too, but no partner is ready to pay for the final development and integration into the EF and that's why they need India so badly. Not as a partner in the R&D anymore (since the only R&D part that is left is the Sea Typhoon), but as a partner to fund further developments and get the fighter to it's real potential and give them (UK/ITA) the chance to divert funds and concentration to the F35 instead.

France on the other side is fully commited to the Rafale and is constantly upgrading the Rafale. That's why the fighter, which was developed with true multi role capabilities in mind from the start, is also on a totally different upgrade level today. Selecting Rafale means, getting a fighter that is fully capable from the minute IAF inducts the fighter (possibly from 2013 onwards), only a few further funding of upgrades and developments needed, because France already cleared this long ago, while a fully capable EF at a comparable level to Rafale F3+ might be available only around 2018. That's why France was able to use the Rafale in Libya in all roles that the RAF did with Tornado and the EF + several naval roles as well!

 

[Taygibay]

@ Sancho ^^^^^^^^^

Entirely agreed with your sale/re-sale analysis.
Those UAE M2Kdashnine are swing roles ACs

Without a market they are a thorn in the UAE deal.
With the possibility of going to Libya, they form an
advantage as they would allow the country's Airmen
to get back on track towards a possible Raffy buy.
And yes, were they to become available, the 2000-5
from Qatar would be sufficient too for Libya now.
I'm supposing the new govt/ex-rebels not to need to
bomb their citizens anytime soon ( or to rely on the
remaining SU-22, Galebs and Mi-24 helos if so, sigh ).