Page 36 - Australian Defence Magazine June 2019

PROJECT
LAND
“Whilst IOC has been delayed by ‘up to
12 months’, declaration of FOC will not
be affected as Thales will offset the delay by increasing production volumes.”
RIGHT: Deliveries of the Land 121 Phase 3 fleet are continuing.
BELOW: A Hawkei undergoes a series of testing during Land Trial 02-18
at the Townsville Field Training Area in North Queensland.
“For IOC Thales has to deliver 138 vehi- cles. Some of these have been delayed by our engine supplier issue,” Paul Feighan, Direc- tor Protected Vehicles for Thales, told ADM. “All 138 are forecast to be delivered in the final quarter of 2019 after which they will go through a rigorous acceptance process.
“Upon finding out that Steyr had issues, Thales set a plan in place to ensure the vi- ability of the company, including capital and resource investment and in-country support. We have been able to minimise the disruption to the schedule and to our workforce.”
“Thales have kept us closely in the loop. They’ve leant forward very heavily to sup- port Steyr Motors,” MAJGEN Bottrell confirmed. “The advice we’ve had back through the administrator is that had Thales not done that, then Steyr Motors may not have continued to operate.
“I’m confident that Steyr Motors will continue in its current form into the future based on the advice I’ve received. I’m wait- ing on advice over the next month to con- firm if that’s the case.
“Having seen the Bendigo facility, seen their production line, having spoken with
the production engineers on the floor, get- ting to see where they are, and driving the vehicle – there’s a real confidence that this vehicle is going to deliver a significant step change in capability for Army.
“So I’m not as concerned as I was when I first heard the news, but of course I’m look- ing forward to it playing out as Thales has advised us that it’s likely to.”
MAJGEN Bottrell also emphasised that whilst IOC has been delayed by ‘up to 12 months’, declaration of FOC will not be af- fected as Thales will offset the delay by in- creasing production volumes.
“It could be up to 12 months, but it may not be,” MAJGEN Bottrell said. “The other point worth noting is that FOC is not expected to be impacted be- cause Thales has an ability to adjust its rate of production. That’s an important point for Army.”
The sunny side
Problems aside, other elements of the Hawkei program are progressing as ex- pected. The Integral Computing System (ICS), which allows operators to manage sensors, radios, and the Battle Manage- ment System (BMS) through a common interface, has passed through the design and development phase including inte- grated artillery fire control and combat support systems.
“We’ve completed what we call the Stage 2 design and development piece of the in- tegral computing system, so that’s tracking as we had anticipated,” Sarah Myers, Assis- tant Secretary Land Vehicle Systems, said to ADM. “We’ve done some user trials as well, two here in Australia and one deploy- ment to Iraq and Afghanistan.
36 | June 2019 | www.australiandefence.com.au
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