Tag: Dassault (Page 3 of 3)

Dassault Aviation at the EBACE 2019 Event

May 17, 2019 / WIL BALDWIN

The Dassault Aviation group is delighted to be presenting its dual civil and defense know-how at the 2019 edition of EBACE, Europe’s primary business aviation event, to be held in Geneva from 21 to 23 May.

Saint-Cloud, France, 17 May 2019 – The Dassault Aviation group is delighted to be presenting its dual civil and defense know-how at the 2019 edition of EBACE, Europe’s primary business aviation event, to be held in Geneva from 21 to 23 May.

Three Dassault aircraft will be presented in the static display:

a Falcon 8X tri-jet,
a Falcon 900LX tri-jet,
a Falcon 2000S twin-jet.

The Falcons designed and built by Dassault Aviation are a family of business aircraft which have earned a reputation for handling, operational flexibility, low consumption and technological innovation. © Dassault Aviation – All Rights Reserved

On its stand, Dassault Aviation will also be presenting:

a full-scale mock-up of the cabin of the Falcon 6X, the new Falcon twin-jet currently under development. Visitors will be able to enter this mock-up, which is fully representative of the features and comfort of the actual cabin;
a mock-up of the Rafale, the multi-role combat aircraft, which has proven itself in numerous theatres of operations. The Rafale is a candidate for the Swiss Air Force’s combat fleet renewal program;
a mock-up of the nEUROn stealth combat UAV demonstrator built under the project leadership of Dassault Aviation, in cooperation with companies from five European countries, including Ruag of Switzerland;
a representation of the new capabilities of Dassault Aviation’s Falcon maintenance networks, notably following the acquisition of MRO activities of TAG Aviation in Europe and ExecuJet in Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

As well as being the lynchpin of a strategic industrial network comprising hundreds of companies in France and around the world, Dassault Aviation is also the core industrial shareholder of the Thales Group and the leader of the new-generation European combat aircraft program.

Airbus Lands MBDA Boss Bouvier To Steer Strategy

May 15, 2019 / WIL BALDWIN

PARIS (Reuters) – European missile maker MBDA’s chief executive is returning to Airbus as head of strategy as the planemaker seeks to modernise its factory system and explores future options in defence, two people familiar with the matter said.

Antoine Bouvier, 59, replaces Patrick de Castelbajac who becomes head of Airbus Asia-Pacific, the sources said. Castelbajac’s responsibility for Airbus international operations had already been transferred to sales chief Christian Scherer.

At Airbus, Bouvier will be embarking on a battle of wits with a new strategy head at arch-rival Boeing CO.

Chris Raymond, until recently head of Boeing’s Autonomous Systems business, recently became vice-president for enterprise strategy under finance director Greg Smith, sources said. Raymond’s appointment has not been officially announced.

Airbus and MBDA declined to comment on Bouvier’s appointment, which was first reported by AeroDefenseNews. It is the latest step in a management reshuffle accelerated by the recent official appointment of Guillaume Faury as Airbus CEO.

Bouvier, a former civil servant who narrowly missed out on running France’s DGA defence procurement agency two years ago, brings experience in forging defence partnerships to Airbus, which is embroiled in a row with Germany over arms controls.

He is expected to be replaced at MBDA by former OneWeb chief Eric Beranger.

Although there is fierce day-to-day competition, with Taiwan’s China Airlines opting last week to switch to Airbus, the European planemaker is not expected to exploit the grounding of Boeing’s 737 MAX jetliner for now, industry sources said.

NEXT GENERATION

The future of the Airbus A320neo and Boeing 737 MAX – the industry’s most successful models – is seen as strategically entwined and insiders say Airbus is also worried about the impact of the grounding on global certification..

But the planemakers are crafting crucial strategies for the next generation of single-aisle jets from about 2030 – both likely to define the aircraft industry well beyond mid-century.

Insiders say Faury wants Airbus to focus more on industrial strategy and closing a perceived gap with Boeing in production technology, as well as responding to the threat of increased environmental regulation of air travel, as well as new products.

Airbus must also assess how to respond to rising defence spending after its failure to merge with Britain’s BAE Systems in 2012 left it heavily skewed towards commercial markets that are now approaching the end of an extended upcycle.

It is involved on the German side of a nascent Franco-German fighter project along with French partner Dassault Aviation but faces competition for valuable systems work and a growing spat with the German government over export controls.

At MBDA, Bouvier helped forge an Anglo-French agreement on the use of shared missile technology.

Bouvier followed the classic path of a French mandarin from the prestigious Polytechnique engineering school to France’s ENA civil service academy. He had been linked with a number of top aerospace posts such as Safran and Thales.

“His appointment will be very credible with the French government,” a person familiar with the appointment said. France and Germany own 11 percent each of Airbus.

(Reporting by Tim Hepher; Editing by Luke Baker and Alexander Smith)

Dassault Aviation Starts Office Construction at Mérignac Plant

May 14, 2019 / WIL BALDWIN

Mérignac, France, 14 May 2019 – Today, Dassault Aviation officially launched the construction of an office building on its site in Mérignac, France, as a step of its “Leading our Future” transformation plan. The building will accommodate design, development and after-sales support teams for the firm’s civil and defense activities.

“This ambitious project reflects our aim to bring together some of the teams who design and support our aircraft and those responsible for producing them. It fosters collaborative working as part of the rollout of our extended design office concept. The principle is to integrate even more and whenever required, from the design phase, all the trades involved in the product life cycle. This building will not just house offices, it will be one of the means to reframe the interactions between Mérignac and Saint-Cloud. We are expecting better links between technical competence, product knowledge and customer services”, said Eric Trappier, Chairman and CEO of Dassault Aviation. “It is one of the focuses of our transformation plan which, without altering the DNA that has underpinned our century-long success, aims to make our company more flexible and more competitive to respond to the technology challenges ahead and the changes occurring in the world around us.”

The new building will offer 25,800 sq. m of surface area over four levels with a total capacity of 1,500 workstations including 24 modular collaborative work spaces and nine project offices. The building will also provide VIP rooms for our civil and military customers, a Falcon command center, rooms for aircraft system test benches, a Virtual Reality Center, an Immersive Reality Center and an auditorium.

The highest environmental standards will be applied including smart lighting and energy management, solar panels (4,000 sq. m), reinforced insulation, green roofs, and a heat recovery system.

Presided over by Eric Trappier, alongside Valérie Guillemet, Mérignac Site Manager, the “groundbreaking” ceremony was attended by many local elected representatives, particularly the President of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine Region Alain Rousset, the President of Bordeaux Métropole Patrick Bobet, the Mayor of Mérignac Alain Anziani and the Mayor of Bordeaux Nicolas Florian. Representatives of official services, as well as the region’s aviation ecosystem and the media were also present at the event.

Work is scheduled for completion at the end of 2020, and the building should be commissioned in 2021.

About Dassault Aviation

With over 10,000 military and civil aircraft delivered in more than 90 countries over the last century, Dassault Aviation has built up expertise recognized worldwide in the design, development, sale and support of all types of aircraft, ranging from the Rafale fighter, to the high-end Falcon family of business jets and military drones. In 2018, Dassault Aviation reported revenues of €5.1 billion. The company has 11,500 employees.

Twitter : @Dassault_OnAir

Australia Receives First Falcon 7X VIP Aircraft

May 8, 2019 / WIL BALDWIN

The Commonwealth of Australia has taken delivery of the first of three very long range Falcon 7X trijets it has acquired for government VIP service.

The other two aircraft, to be operated by the Royal Australian Air Force, will be handed over in the following months.

The VIP units are being delivered with the latest connectivity solutions, intended to provide seamless access to high speed broadband data anywhere in the world.

The Falcon 7X offers a combination of range, and operational flexibility that no other large cabin business jet can match. The 5,950 nm 7X can fly from Canberra to any point in Asia nonstop or link Canberra to Washington or London in one hop. It can land on short and challenging runways and operate across a wide range of environmental conditions, including extremely hot and humid and dry desert climates. And the aircraft’s three-engine design provides additional safety margin and frees operators of twin engine operating constraints when flying intercontinental transoceanic routes.

These characteristics explain the immense popularity the 7X has enjoyed since its service introduction more than a decade ago. More than 280 of the big trijets have been delivered to date around the world.

“We are extremely honoured that Australia has once again chosen to renew its confidence in our Falcon product line,” said Eric Trappier, Chairman & CEO of Dassault Aviation. “The RAAF already has decades of successful experience operating Dassault aircraft, from the Mirage III fighter to the Falcon 20 and Falcon 900 business jets.”

Australia has been a key market for the Falcon for almost half century. The company’s first business jet, the Falcon 20, entered commercial service ‘Down Under’ in 1967, two years after its entry into service. The Falcon 20 entered the inventory of the RAAF the same year (under the name Mystère 20) and served in the RAAF’s transport and utility wing for 22 years before being replaced by the Falcon 900. The five-aircraft Falcon 900 fleet remained in operation through the early 2000s.

More than 120 Falcon aircraft, including over 50 Falcon 7Xs, are currently flying with public and private operators in Australia and other Asia Pacific countries.

Airbus and Dassault Sign Joint Concept Study Contract

February 6, 2019 / WIL BALDWIN

Paris / Munich, 6 February 2019 – France and Germany have awarded the first-ever contract – a Joint Concept Study (JCS) – to Dassault Aviation (stock exchange symbol: AM) and Airbus (stock exchange symbol: AIR) for the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) programme. The launch of the JCS was announced by the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, and her German counterpart, Ursula von der Leyen, at a meeting today in Paris.

The decision by both countries represents a milestone to secure European sovereignty and technological leadership in the military aviation sector for the coming decades. Starting date for the two-year study is 20 February 2019.

Eric Trappier, Chairman and CEO of Dassault Aviation, said: “This new step is the cornerstone to ensure tomorrow’s European strategic autonomy. We, as Dassault Aviation, will mobilize our competencies as System Architect and Integrator, to meet the requirements of the Nations and to keep our continent as a world-class leader in the crucial field of
Air Combat Systems.”

Dirk Hoke, CEO of Airbus Defence and Space, said: “FCAS is one of the most ambitious European defence programmes of the century. With today’s contract signature, we are finally setting this high-technology programme fully in motion. Both companies are committed to providing the best solutions to our Nations with regard to the New Generation Fighter as well as the systems of systems accompanying it. We are truly excited about having been given this opportunity and appreciate the trust placed in both our companies.”

This planned Next Generation Weapons System will consist of a highly capable manned “New Generation Fighter” (NGF) teaming with a set of new and upgraded weapons as well as a set of unmanned systems (Remote Carriers) linked by a Combat Cloud and its Ecosystem embedded in a System-of-Systems FCAS architecture.

The JCS is based on the bi-nationally agreed High Level Common Operational Requirements Document (HLCORD) signed at Berlin Air Show ILA in April 2018 between the Defence Ministers of France and Germany as well as respective national concept studies.

Its aim is to conceptualise the different FCAS capabilities and to pave the way for future design, industrialisation, as well as an estimated full operational capability by 2040. The study will prepare and initiate demonstrator programmes for launch at the Paris Air Show in June 2019.

Rafale B de l’Armée de l’Air Française en opérations extérieures (Opération Serval) – Vue en vol au dessus du Mali. Equipé de la nacelle Damoclès et de GBU-12.

Story from http://www,airbus.com Image from http://dassault-aviation.com

Airbus, Dassault Finalizing Bid On New Fighter Jet

November 16, 2018 / WIL BALDWIN

BERLIN (Reuters) – Airbus (AIR.PA) and France’s Dassault Aviation (AVMD.PA) will shortly submit an unsolicited proposal for initial conceptual work on a next-generation fighter jet to German and French officials, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The two companies agreed in principle in April to work together on an ambitious Franco-German program to design a new warplane, but are anxious to get some early funding so they can start work on new technologies required for the multi-billion project – with a goal of fielding a new aircraft around 2040.

Germany and France signed a memorandum of understanding about the project in April, but progress has been halting amid disputes between the governments about future exports, and among industry about how to divvy up work on a system to integrate the new jet with drones and other weapons.

One source familiar with the matter said the two companies could submit their proposal by the end of the year or early next year, paving the way for the first contract awards next year.

One French military official told the International Fighter conference in Berlin this week that the two governments hoped to conclude an initial contract in January.

Peter Harster, senior executive with MTU Aero Engines (MTXGn.DE), said the study contract was needed, along with a medium-term budget plan, to help set a realistic timetable and key requirements to ensure the new jet would be ready by 2040.

Harster also called for a separate contract for work on an engine for the new jet to enable optimal flexibility and give the customers direct control over the propulsion system.

Bruno Fichefeux, head of future combat air systems at Airbus, told the conference he expected conceptual work on the program to begin soon, “bilaterally or with Spain.”

A Spanish official told the conference his country was in discussions with both the Dassault-Airbus team, and a separate project being led by Britain’s BAE Systems (BAES.L) to secure a role on one of the projects. A French military official said the two projects could also be merged at a future date.

Douglas Barrie, senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said government and industry ties would likely shift again, as in the 1970s and 1980s during work that ultimately led to the Eurofighter Typhoon and Dassault’s Rafale.

“We’re at the start of that process again now. And I don’t think it will take a decade to shake out, but it will take some time,” he said. “I think shifts are inevitable.”

Senior executives from Airbus and other companies discussed the next generation fighter with German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen at a meeting hosted last week by the German Aerospace Industries Association (BDLI), the sources said.

BDLI declined to comment on the meeting. No comment was immediately available from the defense ministry.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Mark Potter)

Image from http://www.dassault-aviation.com

Lockheed Martin To Build Wings For F-16 Jet In India

September 4, 2018 / WIL BALDWIN

By Neha Dasgupta

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Lockheed Martin will build wings for its F-16 combat plane in India with its local partner, Tata Advanced Systems Limited, an executive at the U.S. company said on Tuesday.

Lockheed is bidding for a contract – estimated at more than $15 billion – to supply the Indian air force with 114 combat planes, which must be all manufactured locally under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s flagship Make in India programme.

However, Vivek Lall, vice president of strategy and business development at Lockheed, said the proposed Indian production of the F-16 wings would not be contingent upon the company winning the order for the planes.

“Producing F-16 wings in India will strengthen Lockheed Martin’s strategic partnership with Tata and support Make in India,” the company said in a statement.

Modi has been pushing for local manufacturing that will provide jobs and also end the military’s dependence on imports.

Lockheed’s announcement came just days ahead of top level talks between the United States and India aimed at expanding defence ties.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis will meet with Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

Boeing has pitched its F/A-18 Super Hornet for the Indian contract as well as Sweden’s Saab with its Gripen fighter. France’s Dassault Systemes SE’s Rafale, the Eurofighter Typhoon and Russian aircraft are also in the fray.

Lall said Lockheed had offered to make India its sole F-16 production facility that would supply the Indian military but also other countries. “If India buys the F-16 then it becomes the centre of manufacturing for the global market,” he said.

Lall said the company planned to begin production of the F-16 wings in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad from 2020. He said these were being produced at a facility in Israel and would not impact any jobs in the United States.

The Israeli centre will continue to be involved in other production, he said. “All F-16 wings globally are to be built in the Hyderabad facility,” he said.

(Reporting by Neha Dasgupta; Writing by Sanjeev Miglani; Editing by Susan Fenton and Jane Merriman)

Airbus Warns On European Fighter Programme

June 15, 2018 / WIL BALDWIN

BERLIN (Reuters) – European efforts to develop a next-generation military combat jet will end in disaster if individual governments insist on dictating specific suppliers or sites, the chief executive of European aerospace firm Airbus (AIR.PA) warned on Friday.

Airbus CEO Tom Enders told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper that a decision by Germany and France to develop a new “Future Combat Air System” was an important step towards expanding European defence cooperation.

He said Airbus and Dassault Aviation (AVMD.PA) had come to agreement surprisingly quickly on their respective roles in the fighter jet project, but warned governments against trying to influence the process.

“It will be a success if we don’t let governments interfere with their demands for the use of specific suppliers and locations in certain countries. That will only lead to disaster,” Enders told the newspaper.

Similar issues have cost Airbus dearly, said Enders, who has often criticised the way the multi-nation A400M military transport plane programme was structured when it began. Airbus took a further 1.3 billion euro (1.1 billion pounds) charge on the troubled programme in February.

“I hope that European companies will insist that future multilateral programmes have clear leadership structures and reasonable technical requirements and timetables,” he told the newspaper.

Airbus, which builds the Eurofighter Typhoon, and Dassault, which builds the Rafale jet, signed an initial agreement in April to cooperate on the new air combat system, with an eye to replacing current fighter jets by around 2035-2040.

Enders also called for Germany to move forward more boldly on closer European defence integration, citing concerns about what he called the “deplorable” state of the German military after years of neglect.

One key step would be to introduce majority-rule decisions in European foreign policy, replacing the current requirement for unanimous decisions, Enders said.

“Europe can only safeguard its interests if it is unified. It’s burning all around us,” the Airbus executive said, citing escalating tensions with the United States, difficult ties with China and Russia, and increasing tensions within the EU itself.

He urged EU officials and member countries to focus less on EU budget debates and more on strengthening security, securing Europe’s borders and moving forward on a joint foreign and defence policy.

The EU also needed to look at tax cuts pushed through by U.S. President Donald Trump that were providing a big incentive for companies to invest there, he said.

“If we in Europe continue to have high government spending and thereby high taxes, we will fall behind,” he said. “The low tax rates and the threatened protectionism are a strong incentive to invest more there.”

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Mark Potter)

Archives