Top team named in FRES work bid
Nov 22 2007 By Graeme King, The Journal
THE chances of the Army’s new fleet of armoured vehicles being built in Newcastle looked to have improved significantly yesterday as BAE Systems announced an impressive bid team.
The Ministry of Defence is currently holding a commercial competition looking for companies to work on its £16bn FRES (Future Rapid Effects System) programme.
Winning work on the programme would secure the 650 jobs at BAE’s factory on Scotswood Road in Newcastle, as well as potentially generating work in the region’s supply chain.
The senior role in the FRES programme, known as the System of Systems Integrator (SOSI), has already been awarded to a consortium of US company Boeing and the UK arm of French company Thales.
It is the next level down in the programme, the role of vehicle integrator, that BAE is pursuing – where it is believed the company will be in competition with US giants Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, among others. The vehicle integrator would be responsible for taking the basic chassis for an armoured vehicle and assembling all the various pieces of kit into it to produce a finished vehicle.
However, BAE also has ambitions to build the chassis itself, using the winning design from another MoD competition which is currently ongoing.
The team announced by BAE yesterday, to partner the company is bidding for the vehicle integrator role, is an impressive line up of defence contractors, including Cranfield University, IT specialists GE Aviation, UK defence technology business QinetiQ, US systems engineering business SAIC, and Selex Sensors & Airborne Systems.
The eventual vehicle will be based on an eight-wheeled design and is expected to enter service from 2012. Some 7,000 jobs will be sustained by the overall FRES programme.
BAE Systems Land Systems managing director Andrew Davies said: “This team, and the know-how within our existing supplier base, can provide the British Army with a vital asset while giving the taxpayer value for money and ensuring the retention of key UK skills for the continued support and upgrade of all the British Army’s in-service fleet of vehicles.
“As the UK Defence Industrial Strategy states, and recent operational experience demonstrates, retention of key skills in the UK is vital if the front line is to be assured of receiving the service it needs.
“Over the past 18 months BAE Systems and its partners have responded on time to more than 80 Urgent Operational Requirements under which we have modified existing vehicles to meet new threats to our troops.
“These are some of the skills, resources and experience we would bring to FRES.”
BAE Systems has designed, manufactured and supported more than 95% of the existing UK armoured vehicle fleet and says it will also bring that knowledge to the FRES programme.
