EUROCOPTER HAS fired the opening salvo in the battle to win a Spanish army order for 15 medium-lift transport helicopters.
The France-German consortium is offering 100% offset as part of its bid to sell the AS.532 Cougar Mk. 1, which would include construction of 40% of the airframe by CASA.
Sikorsky is competing for the order with the UH-60 Black Hawk, and says that it will present its offset offer (which it declines to reveal) "at the beginning of September". A decision on the supplier could be taken as early as mid-September, according to one source.
The competition will be particularly hard fought, as neither Eurocopter nor Sikorsky have recorded significant export sales recently. Hopes are running high for the Spanish order, since the Spanish armed forces already operate 36 AS.332 Super Pumas.
Other features of the Eurocopter offset include:
Eurocopter will help sales of the CASA CN-235 in France;
Eurocopter will assist CASA to install a helicopter maintenance centre in Spain;
Cougar engine supplier Turbom‚ca will work with Spain's ITP to establish an engine-maintenance centre;
Thomson-CSF and Spanish electronics company Indra (in which Thomson recently purchased a 25% stake) will co-operate on building and running a helicopter-simulation centre.
Source: Flight International
