Andrzej Jeziorski/MUNICH
LOCKHEED MARTIN Fairchild Systems (LMFS) is suing German sensor-systems company Bavaria Keytronic Technologie (BKT) over breach of a contract relating to cockpit upgrades for Germany's Panavia Tornados. Including a claim for loss of business, the Lockheed Martin's suit could cost BKT more than $2 million.
BKT says that it hopes to settle the dispute out of court. Otherwise, a hearing is due in September at the International Chamber of Commerce's Court of Arbitration in Geneva, Switzerland.
LMFS' claim is based on an agreement signed by BKT with Fairchild Weston Systems (which later became Loral Fairchild before being bought by Lockheed Martin) licensing BKT to manufacture Tornado colour cockpit-television video-systems (CCTVS) in Germany. The CCTVS is included as part of Germany's Tornado cockpit-upgrade programme.
LMFS claims that BKT is in violation of the agreement, because the German company has contracted to equip as many as 300 Tornados with its own CCTVS, substituting the US camera with an alternative design, and omitting other LMFS parts which it was obliged to include under the original agreement. BKT denies that this constitutes a violation of the agreement, because it claims that early Fairchild CCTVS cameras were faulty. LMFS declines to comment on the case.
According to BKT vice-president of sales and operations, Matthias K"hn, the German air force decided that it did not want Lockheed's camera in the upgrade any more. "We were forced to look for a new camera," he says.
The Lockheed division claims that it is also entitled to an immediate injunction against BKT, restraining it from making the CCTVS or a competing product.
LMFS has supplied over 16,000 cockpit television sensors to air forces, and is now under contract to supply CCTVS for McDonnell Douglas F-18s in the USA, Finland and Switzerland.
Source: Flight International