The Indian defence ministry has short-listed the Eurofighter Typhoon and French Dassault Aviation Raflale for the $12 billion 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) deal.
The Indian defence ministry has short-listed the Eurofighter Typhoon and French Dassault Aviation Rafale for the $12 billion 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) deal, effectively showing the door to the Americans, Russians and Swedes from the fierce competition.
Eurofighter Typhoon and Dassault Aviation Rafale have been asked to extend the validity of their commercial bids till December 31. The bids of all six contenders expired on Thursday.
The ministry of defence (MoD) sent out letters on April 26 to all six competing vendors – US’ Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet IN and Lockheed Martin’s F-16IN Super Viper, Gripen’s Next Generation (NG) from Sweden’s Saab, European consortium EADS’ Eurofighter Typhoon, French Rafale from Dassault Aviation and the Russian MiG-35 – while asking only the two short-listed companies for further negotiations.
An MoD source said the rejection of the four contenders was on technical grounds and that the commercial bids of both the short-listed companies would now be opened. Whoever is finally selected will be retained for further price negotiations, as per the seventh and eighth steps of India’s Defence Procurement Procedure (DPP) under the defence ministry. Benchmarking of prices is being done now, after which the final decision will be taken.
The offset negotiations are still on. The offset policy mandates foreign company from who defence ware is being procured to invest 30% of the deal cost in any Indian defence company to encourage foreign collaboration and boost the business among private Indian defence firms. The latest developments over India’s MMRCA hunt have understandably miffed the US.
US ambassador to India, Timothy Roemer, who on Thursday announced resigning his post, said in a statement issued to the media: “We are reviewing the documents received from the Government of India and are respectful of the procurement process. We are, however, deeply disappointed by this news. We look forward to continuing to grow and develop our defence partnership with India and remain convinced that the United States offers our defence partners around the globe the world’s most advanced and reliable technology.”
He further stated, “I have been personally assured at the highest levels of the Indian government that the procurement process for this aircraft has been and will be transparent and fair. I am extremely confident that the Boeing F/A 18IN and Lockheed-Martin F-16IN would provide the Indian Air Force an unbeatable platform with proven technologies at a competitive price.”
Håkan Buskhe, President and CEO at Gripen Saab, was quoted by defence magazine, Defense Update, as saying: “We have received this decision and will closely monitor the future process and provide additional information if requested by the Indian Ministry of Defence. We are confident that the Gripen system is the perfect match for the Indian Air Force as well as meeting the highest requirements for the international markets.”
According to dejected top officials of Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation (UAC), MiG-35 had already conducted modifications as per requirement of the Indian Air Force (IAF), and Russia was ready for technology transfer as per Indian wishes.
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