Kevin O'Toole/LONDON
GEC-MARCONI COULD win prime contractorship for rotor and cockpit upgrades on the US Marine Corps fleet of Bell AH-1W SuperCobras, if efforts succeed to link the programme with the GEC/Bell Cobra Venom bid for the UK attack-helicopter requirement.
Senior US defence officials have been holding discussions in the UK over ways to merge the two programmes, and are understood to be proposing that the link is forged through the UK electronics company.
The US Department of Defense and UK Ministry of Defence are still working towards the signing of a memorandum of understanding, but sources close to the talks believe that there is agreement over the broad framework.
Under the proposals, GEC would be responsible for retrofitting its Venom avionics into the USMC SuperCobras, while subcontracting work on the four-blade-rotor upgrade to Bell Helicopter Textron.
The cockpit competition for the USMC's 230 SuperCobra fleet had been put on hold in favour of the four-blade rotor, which the force estimates could yield savings of $4 billion over the 20-year operating life of the fleet. By linking the two, the USMC now hopes to carry out both programmes within existing budgets.
Effectively, the British Army programme for 91 attack helicopters would underwrite the cost of the avionics development, while the USMC programme funds the rotor work.
Bell and GEC point out that there would be additional cost savings from enlarging the programme to 320 helicopters, as well as increased export potential.
Bell and GEC suggest privately that further co-operation would not be ruled out, even if the UK bid fails, although, for the USMC cockpit competition, that would run into questions over the lack of a US company taking the lead on systems integration.
The two companies are on competing teams for the stalled USMC selection, with Bell partnering Loral and GEC teamed with EER.
Source: Flight International