Cobham has announced that QinetiQ will join Draken International and 3SDL as a member of the Cobham team to develop solutions for the delivery of operational readiness training under the UK Air Support to Defence Operational Training (ASDOT) programme.
The companies say that the introduction of QinetiQ to the Cobham team “will bring additional innovative synthetic and aerial target technology, further balancing the Cobham team’s capability across the Live, Virtual and Constructive (LVC) domains”, try saying that quickly!
“QinetiQ’s clear pedigree in test, evaluation and certification will add increased assurance and safety expertise to the ASDOT programme, by de-risking the introduction of complex new platforms to meet the MoD’s requirements.”
David Lockwood, Cobham plc CEO said:
“We’re delighted to have secured QinetiQ as part of the Cobham team, alongside both Draken International and 3SDL, to deliver ASDOT. QinetiQ not only brings additional technological capabilities in the live, virtual and constructive domains, but also adds another strong UK defence company to our offering, cementing the Cobham team as the only true sovereign capability for ASDOT.”
Steve Wadey, QinetiQ CEO said:
“QinetiQ is thrilled to have joined this strong team headed by Cobham for the ASDOT programme. Our value added technologies and expertise in the synthetic, aerial target, operational training, test and safety assurance domains are a natural fit with the Cobham team, and we feel that we are best placed to deliver a long-term partnered approach together, led by UK industry, in collaboration with the UK MoD.”
Also bidding is the Leonardo, Top Aces and Inzpire team, named Red Aces, which was recently down-selected by the Ministry of Defence to compete for the contract.
The UK’s Air Support to Defence Operational Training (ASDOT) programme aims to meet the training component of UK air support across the Air Force, Navy, Army and Joint Forces Commands from 2020, progressively replacing existing contracted and military service provision as these programmes expire or reach their planned end of service date.
In June 2016 the Ministry of Defence released information on what the UK Military Flight Training Systems Project Team would be seeking from the multi-phased programme. These requirements – still subject to refinement – currently cover the provision of live flying assets to meet training requirements for air to air combat; air to surface combat; joint terminal attack controller / forward air controller (airborne); electronic warfare; air traffic control, ground based air defence and aerospace battle management; and live gunnery.
There is a growing segment within the adversary air combat training market for highly advanced aggressor capabilities to be able to perform realistic combat training.
I assume whoever wins will provide the aircraft , Draken already have a number of aircraft none of which are of UK origin I believe the others also operate foreign aircraft. Shame as its more money heading out of the UK to keep these aircraft flying. Couldn’t we release some Hawks and order new ones to keep production running.