MBDA and Korean Aerospace Industries (KAI) have formalised an agreement to enhance their collaboration, focusing on the integration of MBDA’s weaponry onto KAI’s aircraft platforms and a joint approach to marketing these solutions.

The agreement was signed in London, during a Korean state visit to the UK, by Chris Allam, Managing Director of MBDA UK, and Kang Goo-young, CEO of KAI, on Monday, 20th November.

Eric Béranger, CEO of MBDA, commented on the significance of this collaboration: “The combination of MBDA’s world-leading weapon products and technologies with KAI’s proven record of new aircraft development and rapid delivery is an exciting prospect for the world defence market, reflecting the shared values and interests of both parties.”

Kang Goo-young, CEO of KAI, acknowledged the growing global demand for various armaments: “We will work with MBDA to propose enhanced domestic fighter aircraft to our customers.”

A key aspect of this partnership is the integration of MBDA’s Meteor beyond visual range air-to-air missile onto the KAI-led KF-21 Boromae fighter aircraft. Furthermore, the agreement explores the integration of additional MBDA weapons such as SPEAR, ASRAAM, and Brimstone onto KAI platforms including KF-21 and FA-50, coupled with the joint export of these platforms and missiles.

This agreement marks a significant development in the defence industry, combining advanced weaponry and aircraft development expertise to meet the evolving needs of the global defence market.

George Allison
George Allison
George has a degree in Cyber Security from Glasgow Caledonian University and has a keen interest in naval and cyber security matters and has appeared on national radio and television to discuss current events. George is on Twitter at @geoallison
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59 COMMENTS

    • Yes with our developing cooperation with Poland this has great potential closer to home as well as the far East and beyond. I wonder what piggy backing this might have with MBDA non UK origin weapons, I’m sure Mr Béranger is keen to investigate those possibilities too. What’s more though this may be the start of closer defence activities between the UK and South Korea generally and our Japanese links might help that even further as collaborations become increasingly more important for top end technological solutions and old animosities are swallowed as a result. I’m sure that SK would very much like to use similar weapons on its aircraft (and perhaps beyond that eventually) to Japan so that they can share supplies in emergencies where increasingly they are likely to be on the same side as big neighbours become increasingly a threat.

      • Korea and Poland would be a great pick for UK to partner with on future tracked Armour vehicles

      • “I’m sure that SK would very much like to use similar weapons on its aircraft (and perhaps beyond that eventually) to Japan so that they can share supplies in emergencies where increasingly they are likely to be on the same side as big neighbours become increasingly a threat.”

        More than possible!

        Thursday 14 December 2023 04:06, UK

        UK signs deal with Japan and Italy to build next generation fighter jets in Britain
        “The on-board weapons system will deploy artificial intelligence and machine learning to “maximise the effect” its arsenal can deliver, the MOD said.

        “The MOD awarded the contract to BAE Systems, in collaboration with Leonardo UK, missile maker MBDA UK and Rolls-Royce, as well as industry partners from Japan and Italy.
        Joint development of the aircraft is due to start in 2025.”

        LINK

  3. I’m seeing a pattern lately …. it’s a good thing that is happening with the UK;s Global ambitions. Good to see that Brexit is paying off.

    • There has always been these developments in the arms industry. Can’t really be said it’s because of some government policy.
      The main way that could be proved is if something happens that wasn’t happening before.
      So if for example the U.K. had started exporting a cherries to Asia since brexit and the reason this hadn’t previously happened was because of rules/regulation from being in the EU.

      • I’m looking at the whole picture mate….. Turkey, South Korea, Japan, Italy, team Tempest, Possibly Germany coming onboard, AUKUS, BAE Systems America to name a few. Not sure about Cherries though.😂

        • Turkey cannot be considered as a partner. Erdogan is versatile and unconsistent in his foreign policy. Childish and stupid character. As long as he kills is own people, hé will remain in power. Does really UK want’s to fall so low… This guy behaves like an ennemy. Where can he possibly be an ally? He continuously threatened Greece, Kurdes, Armenians, Egypt, Israel. You want UK’s weapons and technology being used in which of these threats or war? It is not a trip to Greece that will erase years of discours, public threats and insultes. Before you know it, he will join China.

      • Being objective there would have been EU pressure for an EU solution?

        Although interestingly Italy has resisted that – maybe because the radar/sensor tech is actually UK sovereign?

    • Good move for Korean Air Industries, breaking out of the Korean peninsula and getting a deal with leading European defence group, headquartered in France, some of whose products are developed and made in the UK. 🙂

      • So, yes, Good news as you say. UK getting stronger. Can’t see anything negative there….. Westlands/Leonardo is another win for the UK. Thales UK is another win. UK is certainly attracting investment….. just look at Nissan . Argue with me further bud.

        • Let me try. Source, House of commons about Foreign Direct Investments, FDI data for 2021 (most recent I could find):

          The value of inward FDI in the UK (i.e. the stock of FDI invested in the UK) was £2.0 trillion, up very slightly from 2020.

          And we know what happened leading to Brexit with a vertical drop. But if you don’t remember, I can post that too

          • I detect much hate of this Country in your ramblings. Too many like you want to put it down, you need to move on now, be positive.

        • Access to the EU single market was a key factor in the Nissan decision to build manufacturing in the UK. Nissan are in it for the long haul and the Japanese (and their Emperor) have an affinity with British Imperial religious history. King Charles was anointed with holy oils.They see the cultural similarities. Following Brexit we have persuaded them to stay with subsidies and by negotiating trade concessions with the EU which provide equivalent financial incentives to leverage the assets they have. The EU are being kinder to us than we are to ourselves e.g. deferring for yet another 3 years the tariffs on UK made EV car batteries.
          Brexit has to be seen psychologically as a national abreaction. We are emerging from a kind of bereavement; the end of Empire. Its no co-incidence that we saw the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, the last of the empire monarchs. We have probably seen the last Commonwealth games and more commonwealth nations will become republics. We joined the EU because it was a safe place to be for a grieving nation. BMW came to Oxford and Swindon to build Minis. France was invited in to run our water companies. Airbus took over Broughton. We have a lot to thank them for. Brexit was a kind of resurrection …our empire had died but eventually realised that we had survived. Life goes on. The EU were not exploiting us, they were taking care of us until we recovered. Now we are rebuilding those relationships on a more confident footing; with Italy, Sweden, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands and also with Japan and Korea. Australia, Canada and likely NZ buy our frigates on their merits as peer nations not dominions. India is no longer an East India company place to be exploited….they will take us to the cleaners in any trade deal.
          Our economy has been hobbled with war debts and loss of cheap empire food for a century or more. Covid, Brexit and Putin have stressed the whole world but it is clear that its sensible for us to have frictionless trade arrangements with our nearest neighbours. This will become more obvious as we increasing share a European renewable energy grid which might eventually stretch to include Moroccan solar panels. At the end of the day geography matters. The Ukrainians and the Poles know that very well.

  4. Could you de-CAMM CAMM-MR?
    So, CAMM was developed from ASRAAM by MBDA as a ground-based system. So could you reverse that to have air-launched CAMM-MR as a cheap BVR missile? Would be a useful interim between Meteor and ASRAAM, whilst european built.

    • Interesting question. Just checked as I thought it has been updated in recent years and has incorporated CAAM related improvements accordingly. I have no idea how similar the missile profiles are mind as the related parts seem to based around the rocket motor, seeker and other electronics.

    • Well interestingly the Japan UK medium. Range air to air missile program comes. To an end next year…the Japanese are taking the learning to develop a cheap medium range missile, the UK is going to stick with Meteor and ( by the looks of it ) fined 2 billion quid for a mode life upgrade…Japan decided the UK meteor opton would be to expensive.

      • It’s been a very popular export missile so I can’t see that it will be that expensive relative to effectiveness. It’s still the most deadly missile in the world. Missiles like AIM 260 might get a greater range but likely only when being lobbed at high altitude. Having an air breathing A2A missile is still a game changer.

        • It’s over £1m a missile. I think it’s worth it as it gives you first shot abilities.
          Going forward thoughts need to be put into what targets are the planes/missiles going to be expected to deal with. If it’s aircraft then expensive missiles are fine as even the largest airforces don’t have more than a few thousand aircraft.
          If aircraft are going to be used to also deal with cruise missiles, 1 way drones etc the targets some mount up to thousands.
          Now what makes missiles expensive and what could be changed to still have a capable weapon but cheaper is beyond my knowledge

        • Please keep in mind AIM260 is designed to engage VLO objects, and that capability is essential for J20 and possibly others in the future

        • Well the RAF are happy with it, but as I said the Japanese want something cheaper.They have not ruled out a meteor purchase in the future, but have just said their own domestic missile needs to be cheaper, so the Uk and Japan have amicably parted ways at the end of the joint missile development programme…both seem happy with the information and data they have got from the program..they just recognise they want to develop their next generation missile in a different way.

          • Are we overshooting technical perfection?

            It is a real question.

            90% of capability will cost 60% with much more certainty?

            The assumption is that these things have very long service lives so they have to be obsolescence proof in that service window…..are we killing necessary quantity for perfection?

            Are the opposition aircraft really that good that we have to have a ridiculous overmatch?

            There is a message in this……and the fact that CAMM has sold very well……

          • Personally I think we probably are..meteor as it is now is probably the best medium/long range air to air missile in existence and will stay that way for the foreseeable future…even in the longer term I could not see our potential enemies ( china, Russia, Iran and lesser friends) coming close to it even in the longer terms. Planning to spend 2 billion on an upgrade seems bonkers..knowing the holes we have in capability.. after all that’s 20 F35Bs..or 8 type 31s..what do we need more..making the best air to air missile in the world even more of a golden bullet or an extra squadrons worth of F35Bs and 3 more type 31s…..

            lets be honest not even the US has ever spaffed what will be 2.5 billion dollars on upgrading a perfectly good Air to Air missile..and let’s be honest the US offerings have only ever been perfectly good not outstanding.

            Japan is not a poor nation and they are starting to take their defence very very seriously…their defence budge is now closer to the Uk defence budge than ever before ( living next to china…(china hates Japan more than anyone else) and Japan is well aware that any Taiwan conflict is liable to see Japan hit hard as part of strategic surprise…as well as having an ongoing boarder dispute with Russia). So if Japan is saying development of the next generation medium range air to air missile based on an upgraded meteor is just to expensive I would believe them.

          • “lets be honest not even the US has ever spaffed what will be 2.5 billion dollars on upgrading a perfectly good Air to Air missile”

            2.5 Billion?

            Has to be more involved than just upgrades. That number is bonkers.

          • Yes, I would not be surprised if it’s nonsense, based on overly zealous accounting designed by the NAO to grab headlines and nothing more.

            It’s a joint European developed missile and no one else in Europe seems to be screaming about the Uber upgrade cost while nations like India and South Korea have just signed up for it.

          • Ye but Jim I also would not be surprised…. the NAO is there to highlight the holes with the information they are given by the MOD..if they have identified it as a 2 billion pound cost then I would not be surprised if it’s an accurate reflection of what the MOD are telling them…also the fact the UK Japan joint missile development ( which was meant to actually produce a usable low cost joint missile) has quietly come to an end).

    • You could. However there may be an issue with the missile’s length. The basic CAMM is slightly longer than ASRAAM, due to the pointed nose and tail extension for the reaction jets. According to specs it is 10.6t long. Meteor is bang on 12 ft long and CAMM-ER is 13.9ft long.

      The Meteor design dimensions were constrained, by the need to match the dimensions profile of AMRAAM. Thereby allowing it to be fitted in the four semi-flush missile cut outs on Typhoon. The other issue would be the length of the F35’s weapons bays. These comfortably fit Meteor, with a fist sized gap at either end.

      Therefore, the ER version won’t fit Typhoons missile cutouts or the F35’s weapons bay. There is next to no dimensional information on the MR version. But from images it is quite a bit bigger than the ER version. So that would be out as well for similar reasons

      However. CAMM shares several internal items with ASRAAM, baring the active seeker and reaction jets. There are few minor aerodynamic differences. But in essence they will fly very similarly. Without much difficulty it could be used in an air to air role. It will need a few software tweaks though.

      CAMM and ASRAAM are grey area missiles, in that they do not conform to the normal within visual range (WVR) rules. They can for instance go a lot further than Sidewinder or the basic Iris-T. The main limitation for ASRAAM is the seeker. Being a scanning close coupled infrared array. It in part measures objects based on pixel coverage. So an object over 30 miles away, may only take up 1 pixel. Which isn’t great for target discrimination.

      CAMM operates in the same way as Meteor. Where the aircraft’s radar finds, validates and tracks the target. Where it launches Meteor in a passive mode. Guiding with updates via the data-link. Then makes Meteor go active when it gets within the no escape zone. CAMM would be operated exactly the same. So in that case it could be more effective in the medium range engagements than ASRAAM.

      The longer ranged ER and MR versions would be similar to AMRAAM variants. However, they would need to be carried under the wings or under the aircraft’s belly due to their size. It would be quite a bit cheaper than Meteor, but have similar capabilities as AMRAAM.

  5. Good stuff. The Koreans are getting some great weapons. Asraam in particular is great missile. So will Korea be getting the missiles pre midlife update or with the upgrades?

    • Yes but you just wait till Block 4 & the updated engine – then you’ll see….best plane on the planet…we will only need half a dozen to rule the world I tells ya!

      • By the time block 4 comes along the next generation of weapons will be developed and we’ll be right back in the same position, getting shafted by our US “friends”.

      • They are already looking to include an internal weapons bay and stealth coatings from 2030 ish.

        “Thus, in 1992 the Navy and Air Force combined their CALF and JAST programs into the Joint Strike Fighter program. Its goal was to devise a cheaper, single-engine attack-oriented stealth fighter, variants of which could be used by all three services to save on costs and which could be exported to U.S. allies across the globe—unlike the F-22. Better yet, the JSF would incorporate cutting-edge digital and material technologies to improve efficiency.

        In 2001, the Air Force announced the more polished F-35 the winner of the JSF competition. The Defense Department secured development money from prospective operators, including Australia, Canada, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, South Korea, Turkey and the United Kingdom. F-35 partners received their own slice of the enormous component manufacturing and maintenance pie, integration of domestic missiles and other perks.

        LINK

        First flight of the single-seat KF-21 test aircraft followed a respectable 6.5 years after the EMD phase on July 19, 2022. All six Boramae test aircraft, including a pair of two-seaters, entered flight testing within the next 12 months.

        KAI sprang a few surprise milestones during the interim, including the first supersonic test within the first 80 flights in January and the first air-to-air missile firing three months later.

        By contrast, the first missile launch test by a Lockheed F-35 came more than six years after the first flight of a weight-optimized test aircraft.
        With one-third of a 43-month flight-test schedule for Phase 1 KF-21 completed, KAI still has much work to do.

        Eighty-five percent of the scheduled 2,000 test flights remain to be flown, but sorties will likely accelerate with all six test aircraft available.”

        LINK

  7. O/T. There is a rather nice clip on the War Zone, with an accompanying article, covering the test flight of the mojave from Prince of Wales.

  8. O/T but not by much…the Global Air Combat Program (aka Tempest) agreement between UK, Italy and Japan has been signed. Headquarters in the UK. Head of program Japanese.

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