Andrew Doyle/MUNICH
The UK Government is expected to approve by the end of the year plans to hand the Eurofighter industrial consortium responsibility for long-term maintenance support of the Eurofighter being acquired by the Royal Air Force (RAF). The deal could be worth more than £10 billion to British Aerospace and its European partners over the programme's life.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) appears to have rejected the conventional process of the RAF building up a full in-country support capability for the aircraft. Instead industry sources say the UK favours the "power by the hour"-type support package being offered by Eurofighter in a deal which would enable maintenance support to be paid for on a per-flying hour basis without the need for major up-front investment in tooling and equipment by the MoD.
"The support arrangements will be a partnering agreement with industry," confirms the MoD. "At or close to the front-line, support will largely remain the responsibility of the RAF, with industry involved in off-base component repair. "The detailed contractual arrangements are being negotiated," it adds.
The work would normally be managed by the UK's Defence Aviation Repair Agency (DARA) with maintenance undertaken at St Athans. Deep level maintenance has increasingly been let to private industry although it will be the first time industry support has reached the level now being proposed. DARA and St Athans are likely to be involved in the Eurofighter bid.
Eurofighter managing director Brian Phillipson says: "The UK has concluded its debate and it looks as if it has concluded in favour of long-term industry support."
Germany has already declared its intention to outsource support, while Spain and Italy are undecided but are likely to follow the UK model.
However the UK plans to acquire a greater forward-deployment capability than the other three nations, and therefore is expected to hold a significant number of spares and develop some front-line repair capabilities.
Eurofighter aims to conclude an initial five-year support deal with the four nations by early-next year, though it is negotiating to extend this to 25-30 years. "We're in the middle of some fairly detailed discussions," says Phillipson, who is leaving Eurofighter to run the Royal Navy's Type 45 frigate programme for British Aerospace as part of the company's recent reorganisation (Flight International 10-16 November).
Source: Flight International
