Slovakia Opts for Alenia C-27J Spartan

Slovakia Opts for Alenia C-27J Spartan / The Winner is Alenia Aeronautica with Its C-27J Spartan; Negotiations Being Held on Payment Conditions and Offset Programs

(NSI News Source Info) December 22, 2007: Organizational departments of Slovak Ministry of Defense fulfilling the armament tasks in cooperation with the Army of the Slovak Republic started to solve the need for proper transport capacity based on operation needs of General Staff of Slovak Army from 2005.

The MoD announced the public tender for procurement of tactical transport aircraft for Slovak Armed Forces on August 8th. The purpose of the procurement is not only strengthening of transport capacity of Slovak Armed Forces and their troops in foreign missions, but also gaining permanently available transport tool for all Slovak citizens.

This will enable to react on the need of urgent airlift in case of humanitarian crises, natural disasters or operations of international crisis management, such as salvage operations, fire fighting, monitoring and supplying. By the procurement of new transport aircraft we can secure transport of Slovak citizens, who can not transport themselves to Slovak territory or their evacuation.

Slovakia faced for example evacuation of its citizens from Lebanon in 2006. Also there is a need to transport wounded Slovak citizens from foreign territories and to provide medical assistance to other territories and foreign countries. We underline that the major advantage of own transport aircraft is their permanent availability.

Any other way of securing transport capacity (either from private carriers or participation in international projects for procurement of transport airlifters) does not guarantee availability of transport capacity in urgent cases.

The Ministry of Defense set up a Commission for procurement of transport aircraft to which were nominated representatives of relevant departments of Slovak Ministry of Defense as well as representatives of civil institutions – University of Žilina and Technical University of Košice. With regard to anticipated effect of associated offset programs one of the commission members was the representative of Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic.

The announced public tender was divided into three rounds – prequalification, qualification and evaluation. The winner became Alenia Aeronautica with its C-27J Spartan. Only producers of the aircraft were allowed to participate in the tender.

The data for tender took over: 1. Alenia Aeronautica, Italy 2. Lockheed Martin, USA 3. Boeing, USA 4. EADS Casa, Spain. The winner has committed to implement an offset program in the value of 100 per cent of total sum for procurement of tactical transport aircraft.

The process of procurement will continue by negotiations on agreement for delivery of the aircraft, payment conditions and offset agreement. The Ministry of Defense will not disclose any further information about agreement details or the price of the project until finish of negotiations. The Ministry of Defense has a right not to sign the agreement. Slovak project for procurement of tactical transport aircraft is on the minimum level.

The facts speak clearly: Poland bought 10 CASA C-295s and operates additional transport airlifter C-130 Hercules. Romania signed agreement on delivery of seven C- 27Js Spartan and also operated C-130J Hercules. Bulgaria signed agreement for five C-27Js Spartan with option for another three and Lithuania also signed three C-27J. The Czech Republic signed the memorandum for delivery of C-295 CASA and operates A-319 Airbus. Austria operates small fleet of C-130 Hercules.