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CAE has won a series of military contracts valued at more than $55 million. The company will be developing a C295 full-flight simulator (FFS) for the Royal Air Force of Oman (RAFO), providing maintenance and support services for the Indian Air Force’s Hawk training devices, and upgrading C-130J and Lynx simulators after winning contracts from Airbus Military, BAE Systems and the UK Ministry of Defence, respectively.
“These orders are indicative of the types of opportunities we see as a result of CAE’s global footprint, position on key platforms, and the fundamental value of simulation-based training solutions,” said Gene Colabatistto, group president, military products, training and services, at CAE. “In growth markets such as the Middle East and India, we continue to see a solid pipeline of opportunities for our product and services. In addition, as militaries consider the increased use of synthetic training, there will be requirements to increase the level of fidelity and capability in existing training devices, as evidenced by this visual system upgrade program for the United Kingdom.”
The design and manufacture of a C295 FFS for the RAFO will be the third to be developed by CAE through its strategic cooperation agreement with Airbus Military (CAE is the preferred provider of simulation and training systems for C295 aircraft programs worldwide). The C295 FFS will support the training requirements of the RAFO, which recently ordered eight C295 aircraft for tactical transport and maritime patrol, and will be delivered in 2014.
The RAFO’s C295 FFS will be designed to meet the standards of Level D, the highest qualification for flight simulators. The C295 FFS will feature the CAE True electric motion system, CAE Medallion-6000 image generator, and the common database (CDB) architecture, which enables real-time mission training capabilities.
The contract with BAE systems will see CAE providing maintenance and support services for India’s Hawk synthetic training equipment for five years. CAE India will provide on-site maintenance and support services at Indian Air Force Base Bidar where the Indian Air Force operates a Hawk flight training device, two Hawk cockpit procedures trainers, and a Hawk avionics part-task trainer. CAE India will provide a range of training support services, including hardware and software engineering, troubleshooting, and logistics support.
Finally, CAE will be performing major visual system and additional upgrades on the Royal Navy’s Lynx Mk8 full-mission simulator as well as the Royal Air Force’s C-130J dynamic mission simulators.
As part of the RAF C-130J Hercules Synthetic Training Equipment upgrade program, CAE will replace the current visual systems on two C-130J dynamic mission simulators with the CAE Medallion-6000 image generator. The two CAE-built C-130J simulators, which CAE recently moved from RAF Lyneham to RAF Brize Norton, were originally delivered in the late 1990’s. In addition to the visual upgrade on the C-130J simulators, CAE will add a visual system to the RAF’s C-130J fixed-base flight training device, and perform database updates. The visual system and related upgrades will be completed at RAF Brize Norton during 2013.
CAE will also upgrade the visual system on the Royal Navy’s Lynx Mk8 full-mission simulator located at Royal Navy Air Station Yeovilton with the CAE Medallion-6000 visual system. As part of the upgrade program, CAE will replace the legacy image generator as well as update the visual display system. In addition, CAE will provide new databases to be used by the Royal Navy for training. The Royal Navy Lynx Mk8 visual upgrade program will be complete by March 2013.
