Page 90 - Australian Defence Magazine November 2021

Training support for the RAAF
With a long history in Australia and an eye to the future, CAE’s strategic acquisitions and ongoing investments in training technologies closely support the RAAF’s evolving role
As the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) continues its Centenary celebration and 100 years of service to Australia, CAE is proud to have played a small role in supporting the training of RAAF aircrews past and present. Importantly, CAE also has an eye to the future as the RAAF continues to evolve as a fifth-generation air force needing to operate in a multi-domain environment – an environment that will demand an increasing use of digital technologies and synthetic environments to prepare for complex, near-peer threats.
With the billion-dollar-plus acquisition of L3Harris Technologies’ Military Training business now complete – a business that includes iconic names such as Link Simulation & Training – CAE is continuing its long history of successful growth serving the RAAF.
“We have broadened CAE’s expertise and experience
as a training systems integrator across multiple
platforms and enhanced our ability to offer digitally
immersive solutions across multi-domain operations –
air, land, sea, space and cyber,” said Matthew Sibree,
Managing Director for the Indo-Pacific region at CAE.
“The Australian Defence Force as a whole face an
evolving defence and security environment with new
threats and challenges. We are positioning CAE as an
industry partner who can help Australia, its allies and
the RAAF in particular prepare for this environment.
The combination of L3Harris Military Training with CAE’s Defence and Security business is highly complementary to our core military training business and creates a platform-agnostic leader in training, simulation and operational support.”
CAE was founded in 1947 and, though younger than the RAAF, next year will celebrate its own 75-year anniversary. The company has grown into a world-class training and mission support provider at the leading edge of digital immersion and counts Australia as one of its home markets. In fact, CAE Australia Pty Ltd is home to more than 300 employees.
Some current and ongoing activity for the RAAF
In Australia, CAE remains the Commonwealth’s primary provider for support services on their aerospace simulators, such as the Hawk Mk127 lead-in fighter, C-130J transport, KC-30A tanker, MH-60R maritime helicopter, AP-3C maritime patrol aircraft and MRH-90 battlefield helicopter. CAE Australia delivers the RAAF’s B350 King Air training at a company-owned and operated training facility in East Sale. CAE also built the RAAF’s P-8A operational flight trainers at RAAF Edinburgh in collaboration with Boeing and following the Link acquisition is now the original equipment manufacturer
of the RAAF’s F/A-18 simulators. In a number of these training sites, the company has broadened its scope of services in recent years to become more of a training systems integrator and deliver the management of facilities, courseware, instructional delivery and in-flight training. A perfect example is the recently announced collaboration with Seeing Machines that will upgrade the Hawk Mk127 full-mission simulators at RAAF Williamtown and RAAF Pearce to incorporate biometric data and eye-tracking into the lead-in fighter training program.