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Airbus, OCCAR to Enhance A400M Capabilities

Our Bureau - : Oct 31, 2024 - : 10:44 pm

Airbus has formalised two significant agreements with the Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation (OCCAR), which is headquartered in Bonn, Germany. These contracts are focused on the A400M programme, representing the interests of the founding nations: Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Turkey, Belgium, and Luxembourg. The agreements encompass the A400M Global Support Services (GSS3) and Block Upgrade 0, aimed at augmenting the aircraft’s operational capabilities.

Jean-Brice Dumont, Head of Airpower at Airbus Defence and Space, said: “The A400M is a clear enabler of the sovereignty of our nations and the strategic autonomy of Europe. Global deployments like the Kabul airlift mission or the more recent Pacific Skies exercise highlight the need for interoperability and commonality among our customer nations. This new framework agreement is the answer to that increasing requirement. With 130 A400M in operation and more than 200,000 flight hours achieved by the fleet, the new agreement allows our customers to benefit from significant savings while keeping the same highest standard of services and performance.”

Joachim Sucker, OCCAR-EA Director, added: “To enable sustained operation of a high-end military system like the A400M, a robust support environment is paramount. The GSS3 contract signed by OCCAR with Airbus illustrates A400M user nations’ ambition to sustainably operate the A400M in the most demanding environments, benefiting from the range, the payload and the versatility of the A400M to fulfil an incredibly large scope of missions.”

The Global Support Services contract, applicable to all A400M-user nations, supersedes the earlier agreement established in 2019. The new contract is designed to deliver a comprehensive array of tailored services from Airbus to meet customer requirements, including ground tools, spare parts delivery, and technical support. This arrangement allows for greater flexibility among industry stakeholders and operators, facilitating the exploration of new collaboration opportunities and service concepts.

The A400M GSS3 contract offers a fully-integrated suite of common services that utilises shared resources while accommodating specific national needs. It is performance-based, establishing a partnership framework centred on resource pooling and sharing, with explicit performance indicators to enhance fleet availability and decrease ownership costs.

The second agreement, known as Block Upgrade 0, marks the first enhancement of the A400M’s operational capabilities beyond the initial launch contract. This upgrade is set to improve critical elements of the aircraft’s systems, including flight management systems, while ensuring compliance with the latest NATO standards. New features will include Tactical Information enhancements, a Satellite-Based Landing System, Narrow Band SATCOM, and Wi-Fi capabilities.

This Block Upgrade 0 contract is comprehensive, covering the development, certification, integration, and in-service support of these improvements. The initial phase has already commenced and is projected to conclude by the end of 2026. Subsequent phases, including fleet integration and in-service training, will extend through the end of the decade.

Having demonstrated its effectiveness in combat and humanitarian missions for over ten years, these enhancements to the A400M fleet aim to broaden its operational capabilities in both tactical and strategic contexts, thereby improving overall performance and reducing crew workload.

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